The Dark Story Behind Titanic's Famous Orphan Twins

On the deck of the Carpathia, authorities found two unaccompanied toddlers along with the other survivors of the RMS Titanic. But when they tried to determine who the boys belonged to, every bit of information they uncovered revealed an even stranger tale. It turns out that surviving a sinking ship wasn't even the darkest moment of this pair's childhood...

Toddlers on a boat

And it may have been a miracle that they survived. As one of the boys opened his eyes to the bright daylight of the morning, he stirred and looked around. First, he registered the rocking of the boat beneath him. Then the memories of the previous hours fluttered back. 

Alone and confused

The next thing the boy knew, he and his little brother were being tossed into a burlap bag and carried onto another big ship. But this one didn’t look familiar. It wasn't the one he had been on with his dad.

Unaware of the situation

There wasn't much time to linger on that, though. As the boy remembered once he'd grown up, “I thought it was extremely incorrect to be in a burlap bag!” Only a three-year-old would have such a reaction hours after surviving the sinking of the Titanic... But who were he and his brother?

Who were they?

No family members were awaiting the boys in New York. Because they spoke French, however, they were suspected to have relatives overseas. In the meantime, fellow French-speaking first-class passenger Margaret Hays volunteered to care for the two temporarily.