"Women and children first", known to a lesser extent as theBirkenhead drill,[1][2] is an unofficialcode of conduct andgender role whereby the lives ofwomen andchildren were to be saved first in a life-threatening situation, typically abandoning ship, when survival resources such aslifeboats were limited. However, it has no basis inmaritime law.
In the 19th and early 20th century, "women and children first" was seen as achivalric ideal.[3] The concept "was celebrated amongVictorian andEdwardian commentators as a long-standing practice – a 'tradition', 'law of human nature', 'the ancient chivalry of the sea', 'handed down in the race'."[3] Its practice was featured in accounts of some 18th-century shipwrecks with greater public awareness during the 19th century.[3]
Notable invocations of the concept include during the 1852 evacuation of theRoyal Navy troopshipHMS Birkenhead,[4] the 1857 sinking of the shipSSCentral America,[5] and most famously during the 1912sinking of theTitanic. Despite its prominence in the popular imagination, the doctrine was unevenly applied.[3][6] The use of "women and children first" during theBirkenhead evacuation was a "celebrated exception", used to establish a tradition of English chivalry during the second half of the 19th century.[3]
In a 2012 interview with theBBC, maritime expert Robert Ashdown stated that, in modern-day evacuations, people will usually help the most vulnerable – typically those injured, elderly or very young – to escape first.[4]
The first documented application of "women and children first" was in May 1840 when, after a lightning strike, fire broke out aboard the AmericanpacketPoland en route from New York toLe Havre. According to a passenger, J.H. Buckingham of Boston:
... the captain said that he had little doubt that the ship was on fire, and that we must endeavor to get at it. On a suggestion that we might be obliged to take to the boats, it was immediately remarked by one of our French passengers, and responded to by others – "Let us take care of the women and children first."[7]
This led to a precautionary evacuation of women, children and a few male passengers into the longboat, while the other male passengers and crew remained aboard to fight the blaze.[8] As Buckingham was a journalist, his vivid account of the incident was published first in theBoston Courier, picked up by other papers includingThe Times (London) and also reprinted in a book published in the same year,[7] thus gaining wide currency.
The phrase appeared prominently in the 1860 novelHarrington: A Story of True Love, byWilliam Douglas O'Connor,[9] during the recounting of the death of Captain Harrington, the father of the eponymous character John Harrington. Captain Harrington's fictional death illustrates not only the concept of "women and children first" but also that of "the captain goes down with the ship".[10]
"Back from the boats," [Captain Harrington] shouts, catchin' up thehand-spike. "The first man that touches a boat I'llbrain. Women and children first, men."...
"Timbs," says he, "give my love to my wife and boy, if I never see 'em again. God bless ye, men."...
[Captain Eldad] paused, wiping away with his sleeve the salt tears which the simple epic of a brave man's death brought to his eyes."That was the story, and them was the last words Timbs brought home to your mother ... An' that's the way he died. Women and children saved. That's a comfort...But he died...
"It was a manly way to leave the world," [John Harrington] said. "Life is sweet to me with the memory of such a father."
— William Douglas O'Connor
During the 19th and early 20th centuries, ships typically did not carry enough lifeboats to save all the passengers and crew in the event of disaster. In 1870, answering a question at theHouse of Commons of the United Kingdom about the sinking of thepaddle steamerNormandy,George Shaw-Lefevre said that,[11]
In the opinion of theBoard of Trade, it will not be possible to compel the passenger steamers running between England and France to have boats sufficient for the very numerous passengers they often carry. They would encumber the decks, and rather add to the danger than detract from it.
The practice of prioritising women and children gained widespread currency following the actions of soldiers during the sinking of theRoyal Navy troopshipHMS Birkenhead in 1852 after it struck rocks.[4] Captain Robert Salmond RN ordered Colonel Seton to send men to thechain pumps; 60 were directed to this task, 60 more were assigned to thetackles of the lifeboats, and the rest were assembled on thepoop deck in order to raise the forward part of the ship.[12] The women and children were placed in the ship'scutter, which lay alongside.[13] The sinking was memorialized in newspapers and paintings of the time, and in poems such asRudyard Kipling's 1893 "Soldier an' Sailor Too".
The loss of the French linerLa Bourgogne in 1898, when 199 out of 200 women died, as well as numerous children, may have added to the emphasis on saving women and children at the expense of men.[citation needed]
By the turn of the 20th century, larger ships meant more people could travel, but regulations were generally still insufficient to provide for all passengers: for example British legislation concerning the number of lifeboats was based on the tonnage of a vessel and only encompassed vessels of "10,000gross register tons and over." The result was that a sinking usually involved a moral dilemma for passengers and crew as towhose lives should be saved with the limited available lifeboats.
The phrase was popularised by its usage onRMS Titanic.[14] Second OfficerCharles Lightoller suggested toCaptain Smith, "Hadn't we better get the women and children into theboats, sir?", to which the captain responded: "Put the women and children in and lower away."[15] The first and second officers (William McMaster Murdoch and Lightoller) interpreted the evacuation order differently; Murdoch took it to mean women and childrenfirst, while Lightoller took it to mean women and childrenonly. Second Officer Lightoller lowered lifeboats with empty seats if there were no women and children waiting to board, while First Officer Murdoch allowed a limited number of men to board if all the nearby women and children had embarked.[16] As a consequence, 74% of the women and 52% of the children on board were saved, but only 20% of the men.[17] Some officers on theTitanic misinterpreted the order from Captain Smith, and tried to prevent men from boarding the lifeboats.[18][19] It was intended that women and children would board first, with any remaining free spaces for men. Because not all women and children were saved on theTitanic, the few men who survived, likeWhite Star officialJ. Bruce Ismay, were initially branded as cowards.[20]
Ernest Bax describedchivalry as "the deprivation, the robbery from men of the most elementary personal rights in order to endow women with privileges at the expense of men" inThe fraud of feminism (1913), and criticized the Ladies First that took place in theTitanic sinking.[21]
There is no legal basis for the protocol of women and children first in internationalmaritime law.[22]
In theBoy Scouts of America'sSea Scouting program, "Women and children first" was considered "the motto of the sea"[23] and was part of the Sea Promise until 2020.[24]
In February 2020, a mural of the sinking of HMSBirkenhead, bearing the slogan, was painted on the side of Gallaghers Traditional Pub inBirkenhead.[25][26]
Her boats were lowered and filled first with the women and children, who all arrived alongside the brig and were safely taken on board.
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