Cool and courageous to the
end, loyal to his duty under the most difficult circumstances,
he showed himself a noble captain, and he died a noble
death.
SAW BOTH OFFICERS PERISH
Quartermaster Moody saw all this, watched the skipper
scramble aboard again onto the submerged decks, and then
vanish altogether in a great billow.
As Moody's eye lost sight of the skipper in this confusion
of waters it again shifted to the bridge, and just in time to see
Murdock take his life. The man's face was turned toward
him, Moody said, and he could not mistake it. There were
still many gleaming lights on the ship, flickering out like
little groups of vanishing stars, and with the clear starshine
on the waters there was nothing to cloud or break the quartermaster's
vision.
"I saw Murdock die by his own hand," said Moody, "saw
the flash from his gun, heard the crack that followed the
flash and then saw him plunge over on his face."
Others report hearing several pistol shots on the decks
below the bridge, but amid the groans and shrieks and cries,
shouted orders and all that vast orchestra of sounds that broke
upon the air they must have been faint periods of punctuation
BAND PLAYED ITS OWN DIRGE
The band had broken out in the strains of "Nearer, My
God, to Thee," some minutes before Murdock lifted the
revolver to his head, fired and toppled over on his face.
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