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Commander Edward John Smith 1850-1912

Visit Beacon Park to see his statue

Commander Edward John Smith, Captain of the Titanic, was born in 1850 in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent. However after his death on board the Titanic in 1912, funds were raised to build a statue in memorial to him in Beacon Park, Lichfield as the centre of the diocese to which he belonged.

The Titanic, launched on 31st May 1911, generally thought to be unsinkable, was 882ft 9in long and 92ft 6in wide, weighed 46.328 gross tons with a top speed of 23 knots. She could accommodate 3,547 passengers and crew and was said to be a ‘floating hotel’ with tropical veranda restaurant, squash court, swimming pool and of course an orchestra, which was playing as the ship went down.

Launched on May 31st, 1911, the Titanic then left Southampton on its fateful maiden voyage on 10th April, 1912, looking for a fast journey to New York. Four days later the liner struck an iceberg and sank. As well as the Captain, several millionaires (including Col. J. J. Astor and Benjamin Guggenheim) were among the 1,552 lives lost that night from a total passenger and crew list of 2,227. Under English law (speedily revised after the loss), only 52 places needed to be provided in the lifeboats. American law would have dictated 2,142.

Much of the blame for the disaster landed on the Captain. He was 60 years old and had already travelled 2 million miles. His salary of £1,250 made him the highest paid captain in the world.

“The public will not readily forget the long and strenuous career of Captain Smith, or the superb example of courage and self-possession he set at the time of the catastrophe.” the Lichfield Mercury enthused. “Neither would they forget his repeated injunctions to his men to ‘be British’ and his rescue of an infant with which he swam to one of the boats, refusing the proffered safety for himself, and returning to his post on the bridge of the rapidly disappearing ‘Titanic’ where he remained to the last.”

The unveiling of the statue in memory of Captain Smith took place on 29th July 1914 in the presence of large and distinguished audience, including the Duchess of Sutherland and the sculptor Lady Kathleen Scott C.V.O. Lady Scott was previously married to Captain Robert F. Scott (known as Scott of the Antarctic) until his death in 1912 and later in 1922 she married again to Edward Hilton Young, who later became the 1st Lord Kennet of the Dene, P.C., G.B.E. D.S.O. D.C.S.

The statue is made of bronze and stands at 7’ 8’’ high, sitting on a pedestal of Cornish granite and can still be seen in the park today.