be considering a run for president against him. Close to both men and fiercely loyal, Butt began to suffer from depression and exhaustion. Butt's housemate and friend Francis Davis Millet (himself one of Taft's circle) asked Taft to give him a leave of absence to recuperate before the presidential primaries began. Taft agreed and ordered Butt to go on vacation. Butt was on no official business, but anti-Catholic newspapers and politicians accused Butt of being on a secret mission to win the support of Pope Pius X in the upcoming election. Butt did intend to meet with Pius, and he carried with him a personal letter from Taft. But the letter merely thanked the pope for elevating three Americans to the rank of cardinal, and asked what the social protocol was for greeting them at functions. Sinking of the Titanic Butt left on a six-week vacation in Europe on March 1, 1912, accompanied by Millet. Butt booked passage on the RMS Titanic to return to the United States. He boarded the ship at Southampton, in England on April 10, 1912; Millet boarded the ship at Cherbourg, France, later that same day. Butt was playing cards on the night of April 14 in the first-class smoking room when the Titanic struck an iceberg. The ship sank two and a half hours later, with a loss of over 1,500 lives. Butt and Millet were among the dead; Butt's body was never recovered. Butt's actions while the ship sank are largely unverified, but many accounts of a sensationalist nature were published by newspapers immediately after the disaster. One account had the ship's captain, Edward J. Smith, telling Butt that the ship was doomed, after which Butt began to act like a ship's officer and supervised the loading and lowering of lifeboats. The New York Times also claimed that Butt herded women and children into lifeboats. Another account said that Butt, a gun in his hand, prevented panicked male passengers from storming the lifeboats. Yet another version of events said Butt yanked a man out of one of the lifeboats so that a woman could board. In this story, Butt declared, "Sorry, women will be attended to first or I'll break every damned bone in your body!" One account tells of Butt preventing desperate steerage passengers from breaking into the first class areas in an attempt to escape the sinking ship. Walter Lord's book