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gold pocket watch Items recovered from one of the Titanic’s richest passengers could become the most expensive relics of the tragedy ever sold, experts say.
The watch belonged to Macy’s department store co-owner Isidore Strauss, who was aboard the ill-fated ship in April 1912 with his wife Ida Strauss. The couple had just returned to New York from a trip to Europe.
“According to one account, they were last seen sitting on deck with their arms crossed, but… [the film] “In ‘Titanic,’ they were depicted lying side by side on a stateroom bed,” auctioneer Andrew Aldridge said.
Ida Strauss did not want to abandon her husband. She famously refused to board the lifeboat, preferring instead to abandon her husband. please stay by his side. “My place is with you,” she reportedly told him. “I have lived with you. I love you, and if I have to, I will die with you.”
Instead, the maid was shuffled onto a lifeboat and given a fur coat to keep warm.
A gold pocket watch that belonged to Titanic passenger Isidore Strauss, co-owner of Macy’s, is scheduled to go up for auction this month. (Bettman via Getty Images, Henry Aldridge & Son/BPNS)
“Isidore and Ida Strauss were among the upper echelons of society,” Aldridge said.
Days after the fateful ship sank in April 1912, Strauss’ belongings were recovered in the Atlantic Ocean and returned to his son Jesse.
New Jersey man’s Titanic belongings found and expected to sell for more than $100,000 at auction
Items recovered included an 18K gold Jules Jurgensen pocket watch engraved with the initials “IS”.
The moment when the clock allegedly stopped at 2:20 a.m. titanic It was submerged.
An 18K gold Jules Jurgensen pocket watch engraved with the Titanic’s initials “IS” is up for auction. “Pocket watches were one of the objects closest to the hearts of gentlemen of the time,” said the auctioneer. (Henry Aldridge & Son/BPNS)
It is believed that Ida Strauss gave the watch to her husband for his 43rd birthday in 1888, and it was engraved with the date February 6, 1888.
That’s the same year he and his brother Nathan Strauss became full partners at Macy’s.
“In the early 20th century, pocket watches were one of the things closest to the hearts of gentlemen of the era,” Aldridge said. “This watch embodies this as a gift from one of Titanic’s most famous couples to the other.”
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“It was the prized personal possession of one of the most important people on the Titanic,” Aldridge added. “This watch epitomizes one of the most beautiful and rarest objects in the Titanic story.”
Along with the sale of watches, Letter written by Ida Strauss Addressed to a family friend, April 10, 1912.
The letter, which will also be auctioned this month, has a Titanic header and is postmarked “TransAtlantic 7.” (Henry Aldridge & Son/BPNS)
The letter has a Titanic header and is postmarked “TransAtlantic 7” by the ship’s post office before being taken off the ship with other mail. queenstown, ireland.
Both the clock and the letter have never been seen before and are being sold by a direct descendant of the Strauss family at Henry Aldridge & Son Auctioneers in Devizes, Wiltshire.
In her letter, Ida Strauss mentioned the Titanic’s near collision with the SS New York in Southampton, New York.
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“Size appears to pose a problem,” she wrote. “Mr. Strauss, who was on deck at the start, said at one point that it was painfully close to a repeat of his Olympic experience the first time he left port.”
She continued: “The danger was quickly averted and the ship is now well on its way across the Channel to Cherbourg.”
In her letter, Ida Strauss mentioned the Titanic’s near collision with the SS New York in Southampton, New York. (Henry Aldridge & Son/BPNS)
Mr Aldridge said the auction house had sold several Titanic letters in the past, but the condition of Ida Strauss’s letter was exceptional, as it was colorful and detailed.
“The fact that it was postmarked means that [at] Titanic’s post office very rare and rareThis will be attractive to collectors,” Aldridge added.
“Size seems to pose a problem.”
Last year, passenger John Jacob Astor’s gold pocket watch sold for nearly $1 million.
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A gold pocket watch given to the captain of the steamship Carpathia, which rescued more than 700 Titanic survivors, also sold for about $1.8 million.
Isidore and Ida Strauss both died on the Titanic in April 1912. (Bettman via Getty Images)
In 2013, Titanic bandmaster Wallace Hartley’s violin sold for more than $1.1 million.
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The auction will take place on November 22nd.
