Hovering now by lifeboat 8 are Isidor and Ida Straus. Ida helps her maid Ellen Bird to get on board, and then steps onto the gunwales herself as if to join her. Suddenly Ida has a change of heart. She takes off her fur coat and gives it to Ellen. ‘I won’t be needing it,’ she says, and climbs out and clings to her husband. ‘We have been together all these years. Where you go, I go.’
