The only lifejacket of a Titanic survivor ever auctioned — worn by one of the passengers in lucky Lifeboat No. 1 — was sold today for $717,772 in England.
The ship was four days into its maiden voyage when it struck an iceberg just before midnight on April 14, 1912, sealing its fate as the world’s most infamous shipwreck.
The poignant remaining pieces of that story were sold to highest bidder during an April 18 sale at Henry Aldridge & Son Ltd., a Wiltshire-based auction house.
At the center of it all was a life jacket worn by first-class passenger Laura Mabel Francatelli, a 22-year-old who survived the tragedy by boarding Lifeboat No. 1, known as the “money boat.”
It became shadowed by controversy, accused of failing to return for hundreds who were dying in the frigid Atlantic waters. The passengers on the lifeboat agreed it would be too dangerous to go back for others as they’d be swamped.
Even more horrifying, the boat was built for 40 people, yet launched with just 12 passengers aboard.
Francatelli was traveling as a secretary to fashion designer Lady Lucy Duff Gordon and her husband, Sir Cosmo Duff Gordon.
It was later rumored Sir Cosmo had paid crew members in advance to reserve a place in the lifeboat for his wife and her assistant.
Francatelli later recalled being told not to worry as she was helped into the life preserver.
She and fellow Lifeboat No. 1 passengers signed the souvenir and took a photograph together after they were safely aboard the RMS Carpathia, a Cunard steamship that came to the rescue of 705 Titanic passengers.
“It represents a pinnacle of Titanic memorabilia,” Andrew Aldridge, managing director of the firm, told The Post. It possesses “exceptional provenance, rarity, and was onboard the ship.
“There has been interest from around the world in the auction, the stories of the Titanic’s passengers and crew are told through these items, names that would have long since forgotten are kept alive by this memorabilia.”
A canvas cushion from Lifeboat No. 1, complete with the original White Star Line flag was another star in the latest Titanic show.
The amazing piece of history went for 310,000 pounds or $419,244.
Another item on the block was a small, rare ticket from the ship’s luxury bathhouse, once used by first-class passenger Abraham Lincoln Salomon, another survivor from Lifeboat No. 1.
Titanic’s luxurious Turkish Bath was located on F Deck. For a fee of four shillings, or one dollar, First Class passengers could treat themselves to a steam room, hot room, temperate room, shampooing room and a cooling room.
The ticket sold for 10,000 pounds or $13,524.
An 18-carat gold pocket watch that belonged to passenger Frederick Sutton also featured in the auction. Sutton did not survive the disaster. His body was later recovered by a cable ship, the MacKay Bennett, and his family later claimed his body and belongs in Nova Scotia.
The watch remained in the family since 1912 and has never been publicly seen before.
It sold for a whopping 140,000 pounds or $189,336.
Another of the auction’s most fascinating items was a ship ticket, that had belonged to Titanic survivor Richard May, who didn’t let the disaster scare him from returning to sea in 1923 on the SS Orvieto on a voyage from London to Australia.
He did book passage on the White Star Line’s competition, the Cunard Line .
White Star Line went out of business in 1934, while Cunard is still very much in operation and now owned by the Carnival Corporation.
May’s ticket went for 60 pounds or $82.00.
Behind every Titanic object was a life changed forever by the disastrous voyage.
Francatelli’s story, unlike hundreds of her fellow shipmates, carried on. She married, moved to New York City and built a life in the hotel industry before eventually returning to Britain, where she died in 1967.
But for collectors — the artifacts are more than memorabilia. They’re fragments of a single night when ordinary objects became a part of one of the most enduring tragedies ever told.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: nypost.com
