Böcker av James W Bancroft

Foot by foot Titanic's lifeboat No.11 slowly jerked its way down the sides of the great ocean liner as it slipped beneath the cold, dark waters of the Atlantic. For the fifty or so men, women and children crammed into the lifeboat, survival was all that mattered. Even then, though, the American fashion designer Edith Rosenbaum Russell ferociously clung to her pig-shaped music box until she was rescued, its tunes helping to quell the fears of the frightened children onboard. Unlike so many of those onboard Titanic that fateful night in April 1912, everyone in lifeboat No.11 would be rescued.Bridget McDermott had brought a new hat before she set off for America. Bridget climbed into one of the lifeboats, believed to be No.13, before realising she had left her precious purchase behind. She climbed out of the lifeboat, retrieved her hat from her cabin, ran back to the open deck and jumped fifteen feet from a rope ladder onto the lifeboat. Other garments played an important part in the survival of one of the lifeboats which sprung a leak, with the people onboard using clothes to plug the hole.Charles Joughin, the head baker aboard Titanic, floated in the near-freezing ocean for around two hours before being pulled out of the water onto one of the lifeboats. He had not succumbed to the cold due to the amount of alcohol he had drunk.Masabumi Hosono, a civil servant from Tokyo, was the only Japanese passenger onboard Titanic and, being a man, he accepted that the women and children first policy had sealed his fate. However, when a crew member shouted that there were two spaces left in a lifeboat, No.10, Hosono jumped in. As Japanese honour considered it far better for a man to suffer an honourable death than to survive in a shameful manner, when he reached his homeland he was ostracized by his family and lost his job.When it sailed, Titanic carried twenty lifeboats that, between them, could accommodate 1,178 people, a little over half of the 2,209 on board the night the liner sank. Eighteen of these life-saving craft were used that night, but tragically only 706 people found a space in them. This is the dramatic and moving story of the men, women and children who made it into the lifeboats that fateful night in April 1912.

The Titanic disaster is examined through the experiences of seven officers, revealing their bravery and the mysteries surrounding the tragedy.The disaster which befell RMS Titanic has become one of the most investigated and analyzed maritime tragedies of all time. Yet there is much still to be untangled from the web of mystery which still surrounds this confused, catastrophic event.The people on board were proud to be part of the ship's highly-publicized first voyage, but as the first batch of officers reported for duty in Belfast to prepare her for her trial trip to Southampton and beyond, they could not have imagined the fate which awaited them. Titanic was, after all, 'unsinkable'.It is exclusively through the eyes of seven unlucky men - the small group of officers onboard for that doomed voyage - that the author reveals the tragedy as it unfolded that night in April 1912. From their assignment to the White Star liner through to their eventual fates.Each one of these seven men behaved with great courage and discipline in a situation beyond anything they had previously experienced and some of the officers left accounts of the horrors they witnessed. Of this small group, four were members of the Royal Naval Reserve; this included Charles Lightoller, who was the Second Officer and in charge of loading passengers into lifeboats on the port side. He was noted for strictly enforcing the 'women and children only' principle, allowing only those men needed for manning the boats to join them.Four of the seven officers survived the ordeal. As the author reveals, one of them had only been formally appointed to the crew the day before Titanic sailed on its climatic maiden voyage. This was Henry Tingle Wilde, who was scheduled to sail with Titanic's sister ship, Olympic, but who was switched to Titanic as the Chief Officer. He reported for duty on the very day the ship departed Southampton. This move meant a reshuffle of the officers and, as only seven officers were deemed necessary, Second Officer David Blair was removed from the crew list and sent ashore. He was certainly the luckiest of all. The unfortunate Wilde went down to the bottom with his ship.Of the many questions asked about that night is that of the fate of Captain Edward Smith. His body was never recovered and it had naturally been assumed that he too had been lost. In Titanic's Unlucky Seven, James Bancroft questions if this might not actually be the case. There is evidence that Smith may have survived the sinking, and was seen and spoken to months after the event by a man who had sailed with him, and who had known him personally for most of his life. Certainly, Smith had good reason to disappear into obscurity.For the first time, a clear picture of the incidents, actions and events leading up to and during the sinking of Titanic can be seen through the stories of the seven men in charge that night.

At a critical stage of the Texas Revolution a large Mexican army surrounded a makeshift fortification known locally as the Alamo. It was there that a small defensive force of mostly Texans had become holed up, and where they vowed to 'never surrender or retreat'. After a siege lasting thirteen days, the Mexicans assaulted the fortification during the early hours of Sunday, 6 March 1836. Except for a few women and children, and one male slave, everyone inside was killed.All this is well known, and to this day the Alamo Mission is an American national monument sacred to the people of Texas. The Battle of Alamo sits alongside such dramatic last stands as Little Big Horn and Rorke's Drift as one of the most heroic and sacrificial battles against the odds in military history. But what few realise is that a large number of those who fought and died for Texas at the Alamo were British.For the first time, the stories of these men, their lives and their deaths at the Alamo, are revealed. They include an Englishman named William Blazeby, who led a troop of New Orleans Greys; a Scotsman named John McGregor, who took to his bagpipes and accompanied Davy Crockett on the fiddle to keep up the spirits of the defenders; and an Irishman named Robert Evans, who, as Master of Ordnance was shot down while trying to set light to the gunpowder in the chapel when the battle was lost.Through men such as these, the full story of this iconic encounter in the history of the United States of America is told in detail by the author. The roles of the opposing commanders, the infamous General Santa Anna and Lieutenant Colonel William 'Buck' Travis, are also examined. At the same time, James Bancroft also investigates the death of James Bowie, renowned, of course, for his large hunting knife, and Davy Crockett. Exactly how the so called 'King of the Wild Frontier' met his end has been the subject of controversial debate ever since Texas fought off its Mexican shackles - thanks in no small measure to those Britons who stood shoulder-to-shoulder with their American comrades on the crumbling walls of the Alamo more than 185 years ago.

The book includes biographical tributes to many of the men who were killed in action, gives details of the places where they are commemorated, and provides biographies with all the up-to-date information concerning the twenty Victoria Cross recipients.