For one couple, these rumors even caused divorce.

Dickinson and Helen Bishop were granted a divorce in 1916, four years after the Titanic went down. Helen claimed that her husband was cruel and a drunk, but their relationship was also plagued by rumors that Dickinson had dressed up as a woman in order to escape the ship. In his official testimony during the US Senate Inquiry regarding the Titanic, he claimed that there had been no official order allowing only women and children to get on lifeboats.

Bishop's not the only man to have been accused of disguising himself as a woman— J. Bruce Ismay, William Carter, and William T. Sloper were all dogged by the same rumors throughout their lives.