Walter Lord. The Last Night of the Titanic (№ 405367)

"Convince the officer not to come back!" begged some lady steward Itches. "Why should we risk our lives for a pointless attempt to save others?" the other women agreed, and Pitman faced a dilemma. Finally, he changed his mind and told the rowers to push away from the ship. For the next hour, the passengers of the boat #5 - forty people in a boat that could withstand sixty-five - drifted on the calm waves of the Atlantic, while three hundred yards from them screamed unfortunate drowning.
Steward Johnson recalls Boxhall's fourth aide asking the women in the boat #2, "Should we come back?" So the boat, only half full, was also left to drift.