"The Titanic," Promptbook for a Speech

[The Titanic had] every convenience and pleasure you may find in any large city.

We tried to get something to drink, but the bar was closed. Nothing else to do, we got someone to play the piano and started to dance. During this, about fifty Italian emigrants came in, dressed in life preservers and carrying their baggage in bundles on their backs. They acted like they were crazy – jumping and calling on their "Madonna." We made a circle about them and started a ring dance all around them.

I and the rest of my company, (and) nearly everybody left on the Titanic stood there, silent and wondering, once in a while slowly walking up and down the deck.

We helped a couple Swedish girls into one of the boats, smoked a cigar and had our eyes wide open and noticed everything that was going on, but could not feel any sorrow – or even fear.

It was more like we were part of the audience in a wonderful, dramatic play and during all this time, the band was still playing, "Nearer, my God, to Thee."

All those who had believed that the Titanic could not sink began to have a doubt, and the glorious last act of a wonderful dramatic play was going on.

Cry, cry everywhere. Prayer and more prayer. Not very often had God been remembered and called on as he was in that night.

It was horrible; but at the same time, in a way that I am unable to explain, wonderfully dramatic.

The place where she went down was immediately filled with drowning people. Many died very quickly, others put up a hard fight but could not stand the chill.

Close around us in a two-hundred-foot circle lay a thousand souls, crying, praying, yelling, and doing their best to save their own lives...They swam to us, hanging all around our canvas boat, and we all turned over. For how long a time I was away from the boat, I don't know. When I recovered consciousness I was floating on top of three human lives interlocked together...When I came back to our boat, it was filled with water and all that held us up was the cork railing around the boat.

[Mr. Lindell's] face had sunk in, his hair and mustache were grey, his eyes had changed...He just looked straight ahead, never made a move or said a word.

In the evening of April 18th, we passed the Liberty statue and soon thereafter we were on dry land, with a richer experience of life than most people will ever get.

We had learned what our own will power could do. We knew that when a man had lost his hope, no life preserver in the world could hold him up. We had learned that no one was going to help you, except yourself, do your duty.

Curator's note: The above are excepts from Wennerström's original script held by his family that he used in a series of lectures about his experience after the disaster. This translation from the original Swedish was sourced from Wyn Craig Wade's book, The Titanic: End of a Dream and an article from the South Bend Tribune from April 19, 1998.