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Reuters.com says “Morgan had motive to sink the Titanic because it was hosting three powerful people who opposed his idea for a centralised banking system”. So did Morgan sink the ship on purpose because of these rivals? Or did he switch the ships to make it look like a accident? Also kind of a coincidence how he didnt show up on the day of the voyage.

Ap news says maritime historians told The Associated Press that switching the RMS Titanic and the RMS Olympic would not have been possible. “There’s a mountain of evidence against this switch conspiracy,” said J. Kent Layton, who has published multiple books about the Titanic.

Both theory’s revolve around money, obviously. But was Morgan doing it for the business or for himself? But here we are today 110+ years later still assuming why the ship went down. We know its the Titanic but he question as to why remains deeper then the Titanic itself.

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A widely-shared meme has taken several facts about the Titanic out of context to make unsubstantiated claims that imply the ship's sinking was a deliberate act. This is not true - experts widely agree the sinking of the Titanic was an accident.

The meme was posted to Facebook on March 1 and has been shared more than 600 times ( here). It consists of two images: one of the ship and a second of American financier John Pierpont (J.P.) Morgan ( here). These sit alongside a wall of text that suggests Morgan had motive to sink the Titanic because it was hosting three powerful people who opposed his idea for a centralised banking system, ie: the U.S. Federal Reserve.

"DID YOU KNOW? The man who funded the building of the titanic, J. P. Morgan, cancelled his long-awaited journey just hours before its proposed departure," the meme reads. "3 of the wealthiest men on earth, whom (sic) were against the creation of the federal reserve bank, happened to be invited aboard for its maiden voyage (John Aster, Isador Strauss & Benjamin Guggenheim).

"It then headed full speed into a known iceberg-field, with less than half the required lifeboats, no red signal flares, no Rothschild or Rockefeller on board, and sank to the bottom of the north Atlantic Ocean. Less than a year later, now that the wealthy opposition was out of the way, the federal reserve was created and USA was turned into an incorporated business, with its own business ID number, '28 U.S.C. 3002 15."

J.P MORGAN CLAIMS

While it is true that J.P. Morgan owned the Titanic and did not sail on its doomed maidan voyage ( here), there is no evidence to suggest he deliberately missed the trip because he knew the ship would sink. Historians have debated several reasons for Morgan to cancel his trip, but none is related to the Federal Reserve.

"I've never been able to find an authoritative 1912 source explaining the exact reason why J. P. Morgan cancelled his passage on the Titanic, but he definitely didn't do so mere 'hours' before the ship's departure," Titanic expert George Behe ( here) said in an email to Reuters.

Meanwhile, Don Lynch, a historian at the Titanic Historical Society (THS) ( bit.ly/3l7uI9O), said: "One of J.P. Morgan's biographers said that France was changing its laws to prevent Americans from exporting art treasures from that country, so Morgan went to Paris to oversee getting his purchases out of the country before the new laws went into effect."

Also from THS, advisory board member Ray Lepien, said that as well as the art treasures theory, "the 'official' explanation was that he (Morgan) fell ill and wanted to take the 'cure' at a spa in France with his mistress." Lepien added: "It could have been both reasons."

STRAUS, ASTOR AND GUGGENHEIM'S OPINIONS OF THE FEDERAL RESERVE PROPOSAL

While it is also true that Isidor Straus, Macy's Department store owner ( here); John Jacob Astor, a property tycoon ( here and  here); and Benjamin Guggenheim, a mining boss, died in the 1912 disaster ( here and  here), there is no evidence to suggest they were the target of deliberate sabotage. There is also no evidence that these three men were against Morgan's centralised banking ideas.

Firstly, Titanic's maiden voyage had attracted many prominent names, and was dubbed the "Millionaire's Special" as a result ( here,  here).

Secondly, George Behe told Reuters he was unable to find any documents in his 45 years of researching the Titanic that proved the three men opposed the Federal Reserve. In fact, a Washington Post investigation found that while Astor and Guggenheim did not take a public stance on the matter, Straus reportedly spoke in favour of the proposal ( here and  here).

U.S. AS AN 'INCORPORATED BUSINESS'

It is not true to say the United States was turned into "an incorporated business, with its own business ID number" after the creation of the "federal reserve bank".

In 1913, the then-president Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act into law, creating a decentralised system that balances competing interests of private banks and populist sentiment ( here). It has had no impact on the status of the United States as a sovereign federal republic of 50 states founded and ruled by the Constitution ( here).

Professor Robert Hockett from Cornell Law School ( here) told Reuters: "It's always a tipoff that someone is ignorant of Fed matters when they refer to 'The Federal Reserve Bank.' There is no such entity. There is, rather, a 'Federal Reserve System' with twelve regional Federal Reserve District Banks spread all over the country (so as to avoid excessive centralisation) and a regulatory agency called the Federal Reserve Board of Governors to oversee this system."

The "business ID number", 28 U.S.C. 3002 15, is in fact a reference to a subsection of the U.S. Code of Laws that defines the United States ( here). Subsection 15 of section 3002 reads: "'United States' means federal corporation; an agency, department, commission, board, or other entity of the United States; or an instrumentality of the United States."

Hockett said: "The word 'corporation' as used in that legislation does not mean 'business corporation.' This is another key tipoff that someone does not know what they're talking about - conflating the word 'corporation' with the phrase 'business corporation' or 'private corporation.'

"'Corporation' is just the Latin word for 'body' or 'entity' (hence 'Marine Corps,' 'Corpus Christi,' and of course 'corpse'). It is used in legal parlance to refer to all sorts of legally created entities. No for-profit business is implied by this usage. To think otherwise is a bit like thinking a sailboat must be a motorboat because both words include the root 'boat.'"

TITANIC'S SINKING WAS AN ACCIDENT

Experts widely agree the liner disaster, which killed more than 1,500 people ( here), was an accident. They do, however, debate the finer details.

One explanation, Behe said, is that the ship's officers "mistakenly believed" that good visibility on the open sea would be an advantage for spotting any hazards ahead in good time. He added: "The ensuing collision with the iceberg was just an unfortunate result of a 'perfect storm' of unfavourable circumstances (dead-calm water, no moon, etc) and had nothing to do with any silly conspiracy theory connected with the federal reserve."

Reuters reported on another possible explanation in 2010 that suggested the boat hit an iceberg due to a basic steering error, and only sank as fast as it did because an official persuaded the captain to continue sailing ( here).

Encyclopaedia Britannica says such a steering mistake "caused the Titanic to turn slower than if it had been moving at its original speed. Most experts believe the ship would have survived if it had hit the iceberg head-on"( here).

VERDICT

Missing context. The meme has taken several facts about the Titanic out of context to falsely suggest the liner was sunk on purpose. Experts widely agree the disaster was an accident.

This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our fact-checking work   here  .

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CORRECTED-Fact Check-J.P. Morgan did not sink the Titanic to push forward plans for the U.S. Federal Reserve

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Repeated word removed from ninth paragraph A widely-shared meme has taken several facts about the Titanic out of context to make unsubstantiated claims that imply the ship's sinking was a deliberate act. This is not true - experts widely agree the sinking of the Titanic was an accident.  The meme was posted to Facebook on March 1 and has been shared more than 600 times ( here).

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“The Titanic did not sink. It was switched with one of its sister ships, the Olympic, before it set sail.” There is evidence and studies we have done to prove that it is the Titanic laying at the ocean floor. Like Melissa Goldin says on AP news “it would have been impossible for the Titanic and the Olympic to have been switched.”  Ap news was founded in 1846 and still remains the most trusted source of fast, accurate, unbiased news.

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Claims the Titanic was secretly switched with a sister ship are unfounded

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More than 110 years after the ill-fated luxury steamship sank off Newfoundland after hitting an iceberg, killing about 1,500 people on its maiden voyage, social media users are resurrecting decades-old conspiracy theories to suggest the two ships were switched.

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“The Titanic didn’t sink. Instead, its sister ship RMS Olympic was disguised as The Titanic in an insurance scam by her owners”. This article gives you the top 10 conspiracy’s involving the Titanic. Some seem more realistic then others. For example some think it was a insurance scam, others think the captain was trying to beet a top speed record, or a cursed mummy in the cargo hold. I believe that it was none of the above.

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What really happened to the 'unsinkable' Titanic? The steamship apparently hit an iceberg on April 14, 1912, as it sailed to New York - or did it? An iceberg collision wouldn't explain why the ship split in half or why there weren't enough lifeboats to rescue all of the passengers.

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Here are 10 of the craziest theories about The Titanic's fate - and one idea that emerged a century later that offers an offbeat explanation about the mysterious sinking.

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10. It was an inside job to collect the insurance money

Conspiracy theorist Robin Gardiner has an unusual idea - The Titanic didn't sink. Instead, its sister ship RMS Olympic was disguised as The Titanic in an insurance scam by her owners, the International Mercantile Marine Group, controlled by American banker J.P. Morgan. Ultimate Titanic disagrees with Gardiner, however, pointing out that The Titanic's construction materialsbore the number 401. The Olympic's parts were stamped 400. Onlymaterials numbered 401 were recovered in the wreckage.

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9. The Titanic's sinking was part of an elaborate murder plot

Some blame J.P. Morgan anyway, claiming the banker arranged an elaborate murder. As the theory goes, Morgan wanted to create a US Federal Reserve Bank which was opposed by his rivals - millionaires John Jacob Astor, Benjamin Guggenheim, and Macy's Isidor Straus. All three rivals were aboard The Titanic. (Guggenheim and Straus apparently went down with the ship. Astor's body was later recovered.) Author J. Kent Layton finds the murder theory unworkable, however - there's no evidence and no one has admitted playing a role: "Conceivably, any one or all three could have ended up surviving a disaster. So why bother?"

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8. The cursed mummy theory

The Titanic supposedly sank to its grave carrying a cursed mummy in its hold - that's the theory, anyway, and the tale has been around for a century. It seems the mummified Egyptian princess also left a trail of devastation across England in the 1900s after being excavated and moved. Alas, Charles Haas of the Titanic International Society accessed the ship's cargo manifest in 1985 and there was no mummy aboard - cursed, or otherwise. Curiously there were large stocks of raw feathers, hatter's fur, and rabbit hair, but no mummies.

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7. A German U-boat torpedoed The Titanic‍

Although WWI hadn't yet started, suspicious minds suggest a German U-boat could have attacked the British ship. Some survivors reported a vessel lurking miles away until the early morning. "The sub may have deliberately targeted the luxury liner or possibly accidentally collided with it," according to a Huffington Post columnist. There's no proof, however. Critics of the theory also point out that the German U-boat attack on RMS Lusitania in 1915 caused the ship to sink in 18 minutes. It took 2 hours and 40 minutes for RMS Titanic to go under.
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6. The sinking was the result of sabotage

Belfast shipbuilders Harland and Wolff have been the focus of several conspiracy theories. As one story goes, Catholic workers were horrified that the ship's hull number - 3909 04 - seemed to spell out: 'No Pope'' if read backward, so they sabotaged the ship. The trouble is, The Titanic was assigned to yard number 401 and her official Board of Trade designation was 131,428, so '3909 04' seems to have been plucked out of the sky. Also, the company was almost exclusively staffed by Protestants, writes Annie Caulfield, author ofIrish Blood, English Heart, Ulster Fry.

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5. Substandard rivets were used to cut costs

Harland and Wolff are also blamed for using substandard materials to save money during construction - even though there was no limit on the budget to build the luxury liner. Supposedly, they used wrought iron rivets - mechanical fasteners - instead of steel rivets. As there were 3m rivets in The Titanic's hull, the theory is that the lower-grade standard rivets were brittle in cold temperatures and popped off when the steamship hit an iceberg. Suspicions of rivet failure have haunted The Titanic for a century but they are still just that: suspicions.

4. The Titanic's captain was under pressure to create a new speed record

Was Captain Edward Smith pressured to set a speed record for the quickest crossing of the Atlantic? There's no evidence that his boss, White Star Line CEO Joseph Ismay, piled on the pressure. Paul Louden-Brown, author of The White Star Line (2000) believes it is unlikely. Still, it's a juicy theory.

It didn't help that Ismay jumped on the last lifeboat to leave The Titanic while 75 percent of the third-class passengers were drowning. Titanic Captain Edward Smith's body was never recovered. His final moments remain a mystery with no shortage of conspiracy theories and conflicting accounts.

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3. The official inquiries were a Freemasons' whitewash‍

An American investigation held in 1912 found that the sinking of The Titanic was an 'act of God' - which, in legal terms, means a natural hazard outside human control. The British inquiry found that The Titanic disaster was caused by a collision with an iceberg, 'brought about by the excessive speed at which the ship was being navigated'. The British also decided there was no truth to allegations that third-class passengers were locked below decks. Neither inquiry blamed The Titanic's owner for negligence, however, leading to theories that the government inquiries were a whitewash orchestrated by Freemasons.

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The coal fire theory is one of the more interesting ideas. Robert Essenhigh, an Ohio State University engineer, is of the opinion that a pile of stored coal could have been smoldering so it was added to the furnace to reduce the fire danger. That, in turn, led to the unsafe speeds as The Titanic raced into the iceberg-filled ocean. Even if the theory is correct and The Titanic set off from Southampton, England with one of its bunkers ablaze (or spontaneous combustion occurred while sailing), would fire be a game-changer? "It's my personal opinion that it didn't make a difference," the former secretary of the British Titanic Society David Hill told The Times.

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1. The 'perfect storm' theory‍

Here's one of the more interesting theories:What if the fire inBunker Number 6 was part of a perfect storm of events that sank The Titanic - a combination of fire, ice, and criminal negligence? Irish journalist and author Senan Molony believes a substantial fire could have weakened sections of the hull, making it impossible for The Titanic to withstand the impact of an iceberg. The influence of the fire was downplayed in the original inquiry into the disaster but it wasn't entirely discounted...

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Fire and Ice: The Titanic's Top 10 Weirdest Conspiracy Theories

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What really happened to the 'unsinkable' Titanic? The steamship apparently hit an iceberg on April 14, 1912, as it sailed to New York - or did it? An iceberg collision wouldn't explain why the ship split in half or why there weren't enough lifeboats to rescue all of the passengers.

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As we may already know the Titanic is the most famous shipwreck in history. Now we have evidence of everything that went down but the real reason as to why it sank remains unknown. “Titanic was a British-registered ship in the White Star line that was owned by a U.S. company in which famed American financier John Pierpont "JP" Morgan was a major stockholder” We know J.P. Morgan was a stockholder and rumor has it that he was trying to set up fellow stock holders because they came to a disagreement.

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Jp Morgan was not doing well with the budget due to his recent accident with the Titanics sister ship the Olympic. Some Think the titanic was a complete scam. This article states “To recoup the losses from the accident and claim the insurance, the company allegedly switched the names of the two ships”. But that still wouldn’t make sense because they would still be in debt. This article also stated “Titanic was insured for $5 million, while its actual construction cost was $7.5 million. Therefore, even if the White Star Line had intentionally sunk the ship, they would still have suffered a financial loss.”

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A video circulating on social media is promoting a conspiracy theory surrounding the sinking of the Titanic. According to the theory, the Titanic ship never sunk and it was actually the HMS Olympic, one of the Titanic's sister ships, that was deliberately sunk. The theory suggests that the Olympic, which had been damaged in an accident, was returned to the manufacturer for repairs while the Titanic was under construction. To recoup the losses from the accident and claim the insurance, the company allegedly switched the names of the two ships, and the Titanic was then deliberately sunk, resulting in the loss of over 1500 lives. The video claims that the source of these claims was Robin Gardner. Let's check the veracity of these claims.

Claim: The Titanic ship was switched with the HMS Olympic and deliberately sunk as part of an insurance fraud scheme.

Fact: There is no evidence to support this conspiracy theory. The theory was propagated by British author Robin Gardiner, but it was debunked by many authors and experts, including Steve Hall and Bruce Beveridge. The differences between the Titanic and the Olympic were more than just cosmetic and included many structural differences that would have made it impossible to switch the two ships. The insurance fraud theory also does not hold up to scrutiny. Several documentary films have presented expert evidence to debunk the conspiracy theories surrounding the Titanic disaster. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.

Initially, we found that British author Robin Gardiner played a key role in propagating the claims around the Titanic conspiracy theories. In his various books, he suggested that the Titanic did not actually sink but was switched with its damaged sister ship, the Olympic, and then deliberately sunk for insurance money. According to Gardiner's theory, the White Star Line, which owned both ships, wanted to avoid paying for the expensive repairs on the Olympic, and so swapped it with the Titanic, which had only just been completed. Gardiner claimed that the damage to the Olympic was so severe that it was irreparable, and that the Titanic was modified to make it look like the Olympic. The Titanic was then sent on its maiden voyage and deliberately sunk, with the intention of collecting the insurance money.

However, these claims were debunked by many authors and experts. Steve Hall and Bruce Beveridge co-authored a book titled " Olympic & Titanic: The Truth Behind the Conspiracy." In the book, they extensively researched the claims made by conspiracy theorists and presented a wealth of evidence to refute them.

They pointed out that the differences between the Titanic and the Olympic were more than just cosmetic and included many structural differences that would have made it impossible to switch the two ships. For example, the Titanic was longer and had a different number of watertight compartments than the Olympic. Additionally, the Titanic had more powerful engines than the Olympic and had a different configuration of its propeller shafts. Hall and Beveridge also provided evidence from contemporary sources such as newspapers and shipbuilding journals to show that the Titanic was indeed the ship that sank in 1912. They presented eyewitness accounts from survivors of the sinking who identified the ship as the Titanic, and they pointed out that the ship's builders, Harland and Wolff, publicly confirmed that the Titanic was lost.

Furthermore, Hall and Beveridge pointed out that the insurance fraud theory does not hold up to scrutiny. The Titanic was insured for $5 million, while its actual construction co s t was $7.5 million. Therefore, even if the White Star Line had intentionally sunk the ship, they would still have suffered a financial loss. Similarly, several documentary films have presented expert evidence to debunk the conspiracy theories surrounding the Titanic disaster. Some of them can be seen here and here.

To sum it up, the evidence gathered from various sources including historical documents, shipbuilding records, and testimonies from experts, researchers, and historians strongly suggests that there is no basis to support the claims that the Titanic was switched with the Olympic and intentionally sunk for insurance fraud. Therefore, the theory remains a baseless and unfounded conspiracy.

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No Evidence to Support This Conspiracy Theory: Titanic Was Switched with Olympic - FACTLY

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A video circulating on social media is promoting a conspiracy theory surrounding the sinking of the Titanic. According to the theory, the Titanic ship never sunk and it was actually the HMS Olympic, one of the Titanic's sister ships, that was deliberately sunk.