An 18-carat gold pocket watch, recovered from the body of Titanic first-class passenger Isidor Straus, has been sold at auction for a record-breaking £1.78 million. Straus, who was a partner in the iconic New York department store Macy’s, perished when the ship sank in April 1912. The engraved Jules Jurgensen timepiece was a gift to Straus on his 43rd birthday in 1888. The sum achieved for the watch at Henry Aldridge & Son Auctioneers in Devizes, Wiltshire, marks the highest price ever paid for a piece of Titanic memorabilia.
Mr. Straus and his wife, Ida, became famous for their devotion, a story later dramatized in the film Titanic. When offered a place on a lifeboat due to his age, Isidor famously insisted that he would not leave the ship until all other women and children were safe. Ida, in turn, refused to leave her husband’s side. The couple were last seen embracing their fate together on the deck and were among the few first-class passengers who did not survive the disaster.
The watch, along with other personal possessions, was later retrieved from Mr. Straus’s body and subsequently returned to his family, where it remained for decades. In addition to the timepiece, a letter written by Mrs. Straus on board the Titanic and posted during the voyage was also sold at the same auction, fetching £100,000.
This remarkable sale eclipses the previous record for Titanic artifacts. That benchmark was established just last year when another gold pocket watch, which had been presented to the captain of the rescue vessel that saved over 700 passengers, sold for £1.56 million.
Titanic Survivor’s Watch Smashes Auction Record
