“I didn’t know that I would ever want to see salt water again,” mused Dr. Robert Boggs of West Chop as he and his family prepared for the beach on Sunday.
Dr. and Mrs. Boggs, their daughter Barbara, 16, and their son Robert, 12, are all survivors of the sinking of the Italian liner Andrea Doria, off Nantucket last week, and they reckon themselves as being highly favored by whatever gods may be, that they are together, well, uninjured and able to tell of their frightening experience.
The Boggs family had sailed from Naples, and seven days out, with the prospect of landing in New York on the following morning, the disposition of the family at 10:30 on the evening of the collision was as follows. Dr. and Mrs. Boggs were playing bridge on the Belvedere deck, two decks above their stateroom and seven or eight from the lowest deck. Their daughter was dancing in the lounge and their son was asleep in his room, under the effect of medications given him for tonsillitis.
Fog Horn Was Sounding
They knew that it was thick weather. Dr. Boggs has had naval experience and is no stranger to the sea and its moods and hazards. The fog horn of the luxury liner had been sounding for some time, and as they approached the coast, they knew that traffic was apt to become thicker. Yet they did not know, except in a very vague way, where the ship was, which lack of knowledge greatly affected their feelings later.
The shock of impact as they were rammed by the Swedish ship Stockholm was terrific. “The bow of the Stockholm penetrated the side of the Doria and went two-thirds through her, on the deck just below us,” said the doctor. “It struck the row of staterooms in which ours was located, missing ours by about seven or eight.”
“We didn’t stop to speak or pause to think,” said Mrs. Boggs. “Our first thought was to get Robert out of his room, and we went down as fast as we could. The ship listed heavily, and instantly, so that it was difficult to move on the stairways, and through the corridors. We saw no one at all as we hurried to our room, but the place was filled with oil-smoke and steam.
“It was difficult to waken Robert, who was under the influence of his medicine, and we never thought of saving anything. We wrapped him up, took our life-preservers from the rack, with one extra for Barbara, and then looked for her. We found her, without difficulty, thank God, and then went up to the promenade deck. During the drills we had been told to assemble there in case of trouble, although we had not been assigned to any lifeboat, and we got there, within a few seconds, as it seemed.
Had to Lie Down and Hold On
“The lights remained on,” Mrs. Boggs continued, “and we could hear the pumps operating, but the ship had listed so far that we had to lie down and hold on to keep from sliding. None of us had shoes or stockings on, we had to take them off in order to walk, and we lay right on the edge, in the scuppers, on the low side.
“We didn’t hear anything in the way of instructions. The inter-com was being used but everything spoken was in Italian. We didn’t know that we were near Nantucket, we didn’t know that the French liner Ile de France was standing by and that other ships were near. We didn’t even know that lifeboats were taking passengers off from the other side of the ship, and we knew that the list was getting worse.
“There was no panic, in our part of the ship. The passengers were wonderful in their calmness. There were some priests among us, and they were administering the last rites to some, which didn’t make us any happier. One of the priests told us how to jump, if we had to, holding our life preservers and our mouths, but the absence of any orders or directions was frightening. We all prayed, I guess, but we couldn’t see or hear anything and we didn’t have too much hope. There were two hours of this, and then a sailor came out of a door and said that women and children could come to the boats.” Thus Mrs. Boggs and her children were separated from the doctor.
Mrs. Boggs continued her story. “We had to crawl up the sloping deck, and slide along a linoleum-covered corridor. It was frightfully slippery, and many people fell and suffered broken bones. When we got up to the rail, there was our waiter from the dining saloon. He gave us the first word of cheer I had heard.
First Word of Cheer
“’Don’t worry, Mrs. Boggs,’ he said, ‘everything is going to be all right. There is a ship standing by, Nantucket is near, and besides, I was sunk twice in the last war and it’s not nearly as bad as you might think.’
“We had to go down a rope ladder which wobbled around frightfully. It was one of the Doria’s boats that waited below, but the ordeal was frightful. They tied a rope around Robert, and they had to help many of the elderly people and children. It was supposed to be calm and it was, I suppose, but the swell was six or eight feet high and there was a lot of motion in the lifeboat. But just a few yards away lay the Ile de France, with an illuminated sign bearing her name, about two hundred feet long. It was a wonderful sight to us who had not known she was there.
“They literally jammed the lifeboat full of people, and it took close to an hour because of the difficulty in handling the elderly women and children. Some of them cried and declared that they couldn’t make it, but they did, with help. Some people jumped from the deck above. We picked up one man who jumped from the bridge. But it took only about ten minutes to reach the Ile de France, and the French sailors were wonderful. The ship was beautifully organized, they took us on deck in their arms, provided each one with a deck chair, blankets and shoes and stockings, and later found us staterooms. They served us coffee and tea and tried in all ways to reassure us.”
Meeting the McAdoos
Dr. Boggs was left on deck after his family departed. It was then that he found the Francis H. McAdoos, Vineyard Haven summer residents, who were also aboard. “The deck was fairly well cleared,” he said, when a sailor called him and said: ‘We can go now’. The sailor wanted him to go over the side, but the doctor, remembering his Navy days, would have none of it. “My impression was that my chances were better over the stern.” He and Mr. McAdoo had assisted Mrs. McAdoo to the rail, and the doctor went aft.
(The Gazette was evidently misinformed as to the two Vineyard families staying together through the crisis and even in the lifeboat, as the Gazette said last week.)
“There was one of the mates. He didn’t have a lifejacket on,” observed the doctor, “he told me to go around the stern farther, and there were some sailors with a cargo-net. The chief steward was among them and he gave me a big grin as I went down the net to one of the Ile de France’s boats. The junior officer in charge handled her beautifully.”
Incidentally Dr. Boggs observed that the Italian lifeboats were driven by a propeller, operated by levers worked by the boat’s crew, but the French boats had oars. “I doubt if anything can beat oars, well handled in a sea-way,” said he, revealing a nautical sageness.
“There was so much of a tangle of cables and gear along the ship’s side that it took us half an hour to get clear. The ship was drifting down on us, too, all the time. Arriving aboard the Ile de France, I walked right into my family and we were all very thankful. Many others had to endure the agony of separation and some of them, much worse.”
No Evidence of Panic
In answer to a specific question, Dr. and Mrs. Boggs said this: “There was no evidence of panic in our class. The passengers couldn’t have behaved better. We did hear a woman screaming at one time, but it was quickly stilled. I think somebody slapped her,” said the doctor. “All the sailors we saw were fine and remained aboard the ship until the last. The lack of information, or of directions, was the worst part of it, and the worst moment was when most of the lights went out and the engines or generators stopped.
“We got away about half an hour before the Doria went down. There had been a rumor aboard the ship during the previous afternoon that the radar was not working. This, Dr. Boggs doubted. ‘I was on the bridge during the afternoon,’ the doctor said, ‘and I never saw a better ordered bridge, not a more shipshape one.’
“The Ile de France received the old-time reception in New York. With 750 passengers from the Doria aboard, everyone came to meet her. The helicopters flew overhead, the whistles blew, the tugs dipped their flags, but all this could not comfort the 15-year-old boy who had lost both his parents in the collision.
“The confusion on the pier was awful, but the Red Cross was wonderful in its aid to the passengers, Gimbel’s sent clothing, and suddenly, it was all over. We arrived on the Vineyard last night, we have been to church this morning, and now we are going swimming. There is no menace in salt water that isn’t over our heads.”
This article appears in July 31, 1956.