Michel and Edmond Navratil had been kidnapped by their father and booked under fake names on the Titanic. When he died in the sinking, no one knew who they were.
Library of CongressMichel and Edmond Navratil in April 1912, just after the Titanic sank.
After the RMS Titanic sank on April 15, 1912, some 700 people were rescued. Two of them stood out: a pair of French-speaking brothers who seemingly had no guardian and who were too young to identify themselves to their rescuers. They became known as the Titanic Orphans, and their story is one of the strangest from the infamous sinking.
The boys were Michel Jr. and Edmond Navratil, and they had been on the ship with their father, Michel Navratil. Except, no one had known that they were on the ship. After their parents’ marriage fell apart, Michel decide to abscond with the boys to the United States. He came up with an alias for himself and his sons, hoping to disappear with them in the New World.
But then the ship sank and Michel Navratil perished. The identity of the Titanic Orphans, who were called Louis and Lump by the media, was a mystery until their mother happened to see their photo in a newspaper.
How Michel Navratil Kidnapped His Sons
The story of the Titanic Orphans begins with their parents, Michel Navratil and Marcelle Caretto. In 1907, Michel, from Slovakia, and Caretto, from Italy, married in London. They had two sons together: Michel Jr., who was born in 1908, and Edmond, who was born in 1910. But in 1912, the couple separated.
Encyclopedia TitanicaMichel Navratil kidnapped his sons after his marriage fell apart, and planned to disappear with them in America.
According to Encyclopedia Titanica, the boys stayed with their mother. But while caring for the boys over Easter Weekend, Michel decided that he would kidnap his sons and take them to the United States. He quickly booked passage on a ship that was heading to New York City: the RMS Titanic.
To avoid detection, Michel booked himself under the name “Charles Hoffman” and Michel Jr. and Edmond as “John and Fred.” With their second-class tickets in hand, Michel and the boys boarded the Titanic at Southampton, where the doomed ship set sail on April 10, 1912.
Public DomainThe RMS Titanic as it left Southampton, England, on April 10, 1912.
Though Michel Jr. was just under four years old at the time, the luxurious ocean liner left an impression. In an interview, transcribed by Encyclopedia Titanica, he exclaimed:
“A magnificent ship!… I remember looking down the length of the hull – the ship looked splendid. My brother and I played on the forward deck and were thrilled to be there… The sea was stunning. My feeling was one of total and utter well-being.”
But just a few days into their journey, the ship would collide with an iceberg.
The Sinking Of The RMS Titanic
On the night of April 14, 1912, the Titanic struck an iceberg and began to sink. Passengers soon began to make their way to lifeboats, and Michel Navratil acted quickly to save his sons.
Public DomainMichel and Edmond Navratil, the Titanic Orphans.
“My father entered our cabin where we were sleeping,” Michel Jr. recalled of the night the ship sank. “He dressed me very warmly and took me in his arms. A stranger did the same for my brother. When I think of it now, I am very moved. They knew they were going to die.”
Michel brought the boys up to the boat deck and ensured that they got into a lifeboat. He perished in the sinking, but his sons were innocently unaware of the danger and tragedy all around them.
“I don’t recall being afraid, I remember the pleasure, really, of going plop! into the lifeboat,” Michel Jr. stated. “We ended up next to the daughter of an American banker who managed to save her dog – no one objected… We had our back to Titanic and went to sleep.”
The next thing the boys knew, they were being hauled up onto the RMS Carpathia, the ship that heard the Titanic’s distress calls, and had raced through the night to come to the Titanic’s aid.
Public DomainThe RMS Carpathia, the first ship that responded to the Titanic’s distress call.
“I was hauled aboard in a burlap bag,” Michel remembered. “I thought it was extremely incorrect to be in a burlap bag!”
At this point, the mystery of the Titanic Orphans began. They had no guardian, and they were too young to identify themselves to their rescuers.
The Mystery Of The Titanic Orphans
In the frenzy following the disaster, Michel and Edmond Navratil became two of the most famous Titanic survivors. As authorities attempted to track down their family, they stayed in the home of another survivor, Margaret Hays. The “Titanic Orphans” quickly captured the world’s attention.
The boys were nicknamed “Louis and Lump” or “Louis and Lola.” Though they spoke French, an article from 1912 reports that they only responded to questions about their identity with “oui,” confounding investigators. Indeed, the brothers seemed more interested in playing with toys they were given than answering any questions about where they came from.
Library of CongressMichel and Edmond Navratil. Edmond has a toy boat in his hand.
“Who are the two little French boys that were dropped, almost naked, from the deck of the sinking Titanic into the arms of survivors in a lifeboat?” one newspaper from 1912 asked. “From which place in France did they come and to which place in the new world were they bound? There is not one iota of information to be had as to the identity of the waifs of the deep — the orphans of the Titanic.”
But as news stories about the Titanic orphans spread, so did their photo. And across the ocean, Marcelle Caretto opened a newspaper and happened to spot her sons.
She had had no idea that they’d been on the doomed ship.
How The Titanic Orphans Were Identified
Upon seeing the photo of Michel and Edmond Navratil in the paper, their mother raced across the Atlantic Ocean to collect them. On May 16, she was reunited with her sons.
Library of CongressThe Navratil brothers reunited with their mother.
The family sailed back to France. Though Edmond died in 1953, Michel would become the oldest surviving male survivor of the Titanic. According to an obituary printed in The New York Times, he died in 2001 at the age of 92. Michel, after his early brush with death and the loss of his father, had spent his life studying philosophy. And, indeed, he was well aware of how close he and his brother had come to perishing during the Titanic sinking.
The survival rates between the different classes of passengers aboard the Titanic was drastically different. Some 201 out of the 324 first-class travelers survived the sinking, while only 181 of the 708 third class travelers made it off the ship. In other words, first class passengers had a 60 percent survival rate, whereas third class passengers had just a 25 percent survival rate.
“There were vast differences of people’s wealth on the ship,” Michel Navratil stated, “and I realized later that if we hadn’t been in second-class, we’d have died.”
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