Titanic: the ordeal suffered by the survivors of the Chinese shipwreck

When the luxurious ship of Titanic passengers sunk in the Atlantic Ocean, in April 1912, thousands of people found themselves the frozen waters of the sea. Only one of lifeboats who managed to escape the shipwreck returned to search for possible survivors. In the dark they found a young man chino hanging on a wooden door, shivering with cold but Still alive.

This man was Fang Lang, one of the six Chinese Titanic survivors, Yes his rescue would go to inspire a famous scene (that of lovers Rose and Jack) in the 1997 Hollywood blockbuster Titanic.

But the miraculous survival of these six Chinese individuals did not mark the end of his ordeal. Within 24 hours of arriving at the Ellis Island, New York Immigration Inspection Station, they were expelled from the country Due to Chinese exclusion law, controversy law prohibiting the immigration of Chinese citizens to the United States.

The six men have disappeared from history, until now. A new documentary which has just been released in China, The six, highlights their identity and their life, 109 years later of the fateful journey. Reveal a story beyond the titanic, a history forged by racial discrimination and anti-immigration policy that has taken on special resonance today, following recent acts of abuse against Asians in the United States

The men were identified as Lee Bing, Fang Lang, Chang Chip, Ah Lam, Chung Foo, and Ling Hee. We think they were sailors traveling to the Caribbean for work. “As a collective of people, they are only unknown,” he told the BBC Arthur jones, British filmmaker and director of “The Six”.

The names of the Chinese survivors were on the ship’s passenger list and the articles dealing with the sinking of the Titanic mentioned them in passing. However, unlike other disaster survivors who were praised by the press, the rescued Chinese were vilified because of the anti-Chinese tide in the West at the beginning of the 20th century, according to historians and researchers.

For example, in a report broadcast a few days after the sinking, the newspaper The Brooklyn Daily Eagle called the surviving chinese creatures“Who had jumped into lifeboats’ at the first sign of danger” and hid under the seats. But the documentary’s production crew’s investigation proved that claim to be false.

Experts built a replica of the Titanic’s lifeboat and found that it would have been impossible for the Chinese to hide without being seen. “I think it’s the same thing we’re seeing now. We found that immigrants were used as scapegoats by the press, ”Jones says. Other contemporary newspaper articles accused the Chinese of having disguised as women for priority access to lifeboats.

Maltese team, a historian specializing in the Titanic, says there is no evidence that the Chinese survivors were stowaways or that they would have disguised themselves as women. “These were stories invented by the press and the public after the event,” he told the BBC. Rumors can come from stigma attached to many surviving men the shipwreck, because at that time the general public believed that women and children should have priority in the rescue.

According to Maltin, the Chinese tried to help other survivors. Fang Lang, the man who clung to a floating door, then he rowed in the boat that saved him Yes helped save Everybody aboard.

Rejected by the United States, the six men were sent to Cuba. A little after they went to UK, where was a shortage of sailors, because a large part of the British naval personnel were drafted into the army during the First World War. Chang Chip suffered from constant health problems after the fateful night, and finally died of pneumonia in 1914. He was buried in an unnamed grave in a London cemetery.

The others worked jointly in the UK until 1920, when the country suffered from a post-war recession and anti-immigrant sentiments erupted. Some of these Chinese men they married british women in the UK and they had children. But one anti-immigration policy forced them to leave the country without warning, leaving your loved ones behind.

“It wasn’t his fault. All of these families were separated by politics, something they had no control over, ”Jones says. Ah Lam was deported to Hong Kong, while Ling Hee boarded a ship steam related Calcuta, India.

Lee Bing immigrated to Canada, while Fang Lang, after sailing between the UK and Hong Kong for years, he became a citizen from the country that had rejected him before, United States.

Tom Fong, Fang Lang’s son, was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin almost half a century after the sinking of the Titanic. The last name is spelled differently in English. For decades knew absolutely nothing about his father’s experience in the “unsinkable”. “He (Fang Lang) never talked about it. At least not to me or my mother, ”Fong told the BBC.

Fang died in 1985, at 90 years old. This was not the case until 20 years after his death, which his son Fong heard about for the first time a member of the family What his father had survived the epic shipwreck. Fong believes his father may have kept his survival a secret for a while. mixture of trauma and stigma. “There have been numerous reports that they were hiding in the boat and disguising themselves as women…” he said. “These kinds of stories were circulating at the time.”

When the research team of “The six” reunited with the descendants of the survivors, many of whom were still reluctant to share their family stories due to the stigma suffered by their ancestors a century ago. During his education in Wisconsin, Fong witnessed many incidents in which his father had to act against racism, including hitting a man who called him derogatory terms.

“He (Fang Lang) was a gentleman, until he felt discriminated against because of his ethnicity,” Fong says. Over 100 years later, the hostility facing the six Chinese survivors has Unusual parallels to today’s anti-Asian racism which is fueled by the pandemic.

In the United States alone, thousands of cases of abuse have been reported in the past few months, ranging from spitting and cursing to violent assault. Fong decided share your family story hoping the public could learn the true story of the Chinese Titanic survivors and reflect on the news. “Because if you don’t know history, it will repeat itself”, said Fong.

BBC Mundo