INTRODUCTION
This is Sydney’s Waverley Cemetery. Many famous Australians are buried here. And you’ll find many classic, sculpted symbols here of hope beyond the grave.
And you’ll also find a remarkable perspective.
Waverly was built on top of the cliffs at Bronte, an Eastern suburb of Sydney. And it looks out over the Pacific. A wide blue ocean stands behind all this grey burial stone.
But what’s even more remarkable is that here in this cemetery you can find the figure who represents Australia’s most fascinating Titanic story.
Yes you’re going to meet the sole Aussie survivor of that mid-Atlantic tragedy, and see how that ship set the stage for a true love story.
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FAMOUS MARKERS
Waverley Cemetery was established in 1877. The first funeral took place that year. Today you can see many well-preserved Edwardian and Victorian monuments scattered about its 41 acres. And this burial ground standing above the Pacific would eventually welcome in quite a few significant Australians.
You can walk by grave markers with remarkable stories behind them. Here’s Henry Lawson: he was born into poverty, became deaf at the age of 14, and had struggles with mental illness. Yet he would become one of Australia’s most famous poets. In fact his poems, like ‘The Song of Australia’ would help define a nation’s identity.
Here’s another famous Aussie poet: Dorothea Mackellar. Her work includes the well-known ‘My Country’, perhaps the best known Australian poem, with the lines: “I love a sunburnt country/A land of sweeping plains/Of ragged mountain ranges/Of droughts and flooding rains.”
Here lies Lawrence Hargrave, the aeronautical innovator who invented the box kite.
Arthur Tauchert was a silent screen star in Australian cinema. He’s best remembered for his film ‘The Sentimental Bloke.’
Charles Owen Peart was a young circus entertainer. He became famous for diving from a 15 metre tower into a small tank of water only a metre deep. Sadly, he died in a diving accident when he was only 19.
But here we have a very different ‘into the water’ story. Believe it or not, it involves the Titanic, history’s most dramatic ocean liner tragedy. And right here lies the one Australian-born person who survived the ‘unsinkable’ ship’s downfall: Evelyn Marsden.
BLOCKBUSTER
That 1912 event has inspired many books and movies of course, including one of the biggest blockbusters of all time, Titanic. Director James Cameron managed to put together quite the love story on that ship, with actors like Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio.
But Evelyn Marsden’s experience on the Titanic involves a real love story, a real adventure. You’re about to discover it.
We’ve come to the town of Pigeon Forge in Tennessee. It’s not that far from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. And this Titanic Museum allows you to become a participant in what it calls “one of the greatest human dramas of all time.”
This is the ‘unsinkable’ ship that sailed out of Southampton, England on April 12, 1912. The Royal Merchant Ship, R.M.S. Titanic. It was her maiden voyage. This was the golden era of ship-building, beginning in the 1890s and ending with the Queen Mary. The White Star line had taken the transatlantic ocean liner trade to a whole new level.
Built in a shipyard in Northern Ireland, the Titanic was 40% larger than the previous vessel, the Lusitania, that had paraded oceans as the largest vessel on earth. Fully loaded, the Titanic weighed more than 52,000 tonnes. This new ship featured a glamorous, first-glass ballroom and dining saloon. It had four elevators and a swimming pool on board – the first one built into an ocean liner.
This was the luxury liner. And this is the boarding pass that would allow you on board. This was how the richest and most famous people in the early 1900s could cross the Atlantic in the most stylish way. But way down in third class compartments, many penniless immigrants were crossing the Atlantic too.
The Titanic was supposed to be very, very safe. It had 16 compartments that included doors that could be closed from the bridge. That way water could be contained if the hull were ever breached.
FATEFUL RENDEZVOUS
But then, on the evening of April 14, 1912 came that fateful rendezvous with an iceberg.
“Iceberg. Iceberg! Right ahead…iceberg, right ahead!” [sound of warning bells]
That day, warnings about icebergs had been sent, through wireless radio operators, up here to the bridge. Imagine the men steering that mighty vessel in this place. They must have been confident, even in the dark of night. They had the latest and best equipment under their feet.
Captain Edward J Smith sent the Titanic full speed ahead, at 22 knots. It was sailing south of Newfoundland.
Suddenly a lookout rang a warning bell and telephoned this bridge. A towering iceberg had suddenly appeared, straight ahead in the dark. The helmsman swerved to miss it. Engines were placed in reverse. But that long, heavy vessel couldn’t turn in less than a minute.
At 11:40 pm, the iceberg scraped along the starboard side of the bow, cutting into the Titanic’s hull. It was the beginning of the end.
PURSUING THE DREAM
Evelyn climbed and descended these stairs many times. This is the Grand Staircase. It cost the museum over a million dollars to build. Yes, a hand-crafted, wooden inlaid, 24-carat gold leafed feature. It took First Class passengers into the elevated shipboard society, the places where the rich and the richer could mingle and have dinner.
Evelyn Marsden had signed-on to the RMS Titanic in 1912, as a stewardess. She was 28 and single at the time. Evelyn discreetly watched passengers gliding into the first-class saloon. They included famous businessmen she recognized, like John Astor and Benjamin Guggenheim. For a week she stood by, at their beck and call.
And Evelyn also served as a nurse for the First Class passengers. So she would have known this area well.
How did this young woman from South Australia make it all the way to the Titanic? Well, let’s go back and see.
Evelyn grew up back in the 1890s, here in the tiny railway town of Hoyleton. There’s not much left here now, but her father came here when Evelyn was 15, to become the stationmaster.
This teenager would spend her holidays at Murray Bridge, a town outside Adelaide. Family friends had a farm not far from the Murray River. Evelyn took a liking to rowboats, and learned to row quite well. For some reason, straining against the tides and currents of that river was a challenge she loved. And Evelyn would become a member of the Murray Bridge Women’s Rowing Club.
In her teens, Evelyn began to see nursing as her life work. After earning a degree, she started working as a probationer Nurse at Adelaide Hospital in 1907. Her salary was twelve pounds a year, and she was given apartment rations, and a uniform.
But early on, Evelyn had another deep longing. She wanted to explore the world. She wanted to experience life in other countries, other settings, other cultures. And this young nurse dreamed of doing that on the deck of a big ocean liner.
Now, all that was pretty unique back in the 1890s, early 1900s. Women typically just stayed home, and worked at building a nice family nest.
Furthermore, Evelyn wasn’t rich enough to travel that way. She couldn’t do what those wealthy business people did so often, sailing from Europe to America. In essence, she was the forerunner of today’s Aussie backpacker.
But Evelyn eventually did manage to find work as a ship’s stewardess. Now she could pursue her dream on the world’s most magnificent ocean liners. She was able to visit exotic places – in Europe, Africa and the Mediterranean.
Evelyn would send postcards to her niece Isla. That young woman would keep 100 of them, postcards and words from Cairo, the Suez Canal, London, Marseille. They documented a life well-travelled.
SOMETHING EVEN GRANDER
But on a voyage to England, Evelyn found something even grander. This trained nurse ran into the ship’s young doctor, William James. He seemed so distinguished, so handsome and friendly. And for William, Evelyn seemed very charming, hardworking and optimistic.
It didn’t take long for those two to fall in love. They found ways to work together. And they could take moments to walk around on the upper deck together, under a wide sky, looking out at a vast ocean. Their feelings, growing stronger and stronger, seemed as encompassing as the Atlantic.
They started making plans for a life together. William was working for the White Star Line as a physician. Evelyn managed to transfer over to that company, as a stewardess. They were hoping to be assigned to the same ocean vessels.
And it happened, both got a very enviable assignment in 1912. They were to be placed on board the new RMS Titanic. This couple would become one of the first to experience the style, opulence, and state-of-the-art engineering of one of the wonders of that age.
One day, Evelyn’s niece Isla got a postcard from William, after he was assigned to the Titanic, delighted with the thought of sailing with Evelyn. He’d proposed; she’d said yes. Now this was his fiancé. So, he sent her cousin a warm message: “I shall see you someday soon.”
But then, at the last minute, Dr. James, was taken off the ship. The White Star Line made a sudden roster change. The couple was very, very disappointed. They had to say a sad good-bye on the dock. Little did they realise at the time, this would actually save James’s life.
PROVIDENTIAL LOVE
After the Titanic’s collision with the iceberg, Evelyn didn’t just panic. She went up on the deck and began helping people. As the ship leaned ominously into the ocean, she scurried about, boarding women and children onto Lifeboat 16.
As it filled up, Bruce Ismay, the manager of the White Star Line, spotted Evelyn still looking for more women and children. He quickly ordered her to jump in. She protested, “But I’m only a stewardess.”
“Never mind,” he replied, “I’ve seen you give way to several others. It’s your turn now.” Evelyn was the last passenger onto lifeboat 16.
An officer on the port side of the ship lowered them down to the water at 1:35 am. They were told to move away in the bitter cold, so the little boat wouldn’t be dragged under when that huge vessel plunged down.
“NEARER MY GOD…”
Then, as they moved away, Evelyn could hear a shipboard band playing the classic hymn, “Nearer My God to Thee.” That was the song of faith that would keep rising off the Titanic’s deck, as the vessel went down.
Evelyn would stay on that lifeboat, drifting in the dark Atlantic, for two-and-a-half hours. Slowly, the other passengers began to notice something remarkable. Evelyn was rowing the boat – and also taking care of a baby!
She kept rowing with the men. She kept at it in that dark, cold terrifying night, helping to keep that lifeboat on a course away from the sunken Titanic, and toward other ship lanes. Her hands would be rubbed raw by the oars through those long, dark hours.
But finally at 7:00 in the morning, the Carpathia came over the horizon. That was the only ship that would arrive to rescue people on lifeboats. More than 1500, out of the 2208 passengers and crew on that ship, had perished. Evelyn was now sailing, in a warm vessel, toward New York.
AN AGONISING WAIT
Back in London, Dr. William James waited in agony. He had no idea if his fiancé had survived that disaster that killed so many. But five days after the Titanic sank, she managed to get a telegram out to family. It said simply “Evelyn alive.”
William got the word, and almost slumped to the ground. Now he had a life again. Now he was going to see his beloved Evelyn again, face to face. Evelyn managed to get on a ship from New York to London. This couple’s embrace on the dock would stick with them for a long time.
What had happened, seemed remarkable to them. William had been transferred just before the Titanic departed; Evelyn survived among the hundreds who didn’t. They were meant to be together!
So William wasted no time. They got married very quickly, in Southampton. The happy couple made it back to Australia in November of 1912. James and Evelyn settled in Semaphore, South Australia.
Dr. James began his practice as a physician, evidently working at the Royal Adelaide Hospital. In time they’d move to Bondi, Sydney, where Evelyn’s husband continued seeing patients. They would have no children. But they had a wonderful life together. That tragic vessel somehow permitted a happy ending!
LIFE’S PERILS
The Titanic story has an enduring appeal, of course – many books, shows, blockbusters. It speaks to us of life’s perils, the way we may sink down when we least expect it.
After all, our world today isn’t terribly stable. There are big dangers out there. Terrorism, for example, isn’t going away. Ethnic and cultural conflicts keep blowing up here and there. The world economy goes up and down – yes, even more dramatically than a ship trying to make it through a storm.
In other words, there are plenty of threats around us. There are plenty of things that can keep us worried and anxious.
So a big life question is this: how can we keep stable? How can we keep steady? How can we keep rowing our lifeboat, even through the dark hours, like Evelyn Marsden? This Aussie survivor’s story actually suggests a key element.
THE KEY ELEMENT
Remember what Evelyn was listening to, as she rowed away from the sinking Titanic? Remember the hymn, “Nearer My God to Thee”? Those musicians on the deck kept playing it, even as the deck angled toward the ocean.
Why? Because we need to grab hold of something steady, in our chaotic world. And the steadiest thing is this: the Rock of Ages. The God of Scripture is the greatest source of stability. God is rock-steady, supremely at peace. Tranquillity flows out of the eternal One. This changeless, consistent God can bring his peace so close that it becomes a love story.
You can get really close to him. You can make a commitment, like William and Evelyn did under the wide sky. All kinds of people, over the ages, have found great peace and stability [by] getting into a Heavenly Father’s love story. Getting “Nearer My God to Thee.”
Evelyn and William are lying side by side here in Waverley Cemetery. This gravestone reflects a life together. The couple’s grave was actually unmarked until October of 2000, when this headstone was erected. Evelyn passed away in 1938. She was just 54. William James had to bury the love of his life, right here.
And living without Evelyn just didn’t seem doable, even to a prominent physician. A week later, William passed away – some say of a broken heart. Resting together, resting peacefully.
[sound of hymn singing]
A GOOD PLACE
Where has your life brought you to? Can you sense peace, even in the middle of a storm? Can you keep rowing to a good place, not just fall to misfortune?
You know, for me, this Waverley Cemetery suggests a ‘good place’ more beautifully than just about anywhere else. Because the tombstones here have this view out to the wide ocean. They stand next to a big, blue, open world.
That’s what the God of Peace can bring us. That’s what the Rock of Ages can give us. A peaceful, stable life. He enables us to keep rowing to a good place.
Take hold of the Rock of Ages. This can become your great love story. You can make a commitment. You can acknowledge the providences that have moved you toward God; the ways He’s come close to you.
Focus on the tune those musicians played on the sinking Titanic, “Nearer my God to Thee”. Nothing helps us more than getting closer to the Rock of Ages. Nothing takes us to a wider, more peaceful place than a relationship with this eternal Heavenly Father.
[sound of hymn singing]
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Dear Heavenly Father, We thank you that we have a God in heaven who loves us and cares for us and who guides our lives. We thank you for the peace and happiness that you provide and we ask your blessing on us and our families. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
