A gold pocket watch that belonged to the Titanic’s richest passenger sold at auction on Saturday for £1.175m (€1.37m), according to British auction house Henry Aldridge & Son.
The price paid by an American collector was almost ten times the estimated value of the watch (100,000-150,000 sterling, i.e. 116,000-175,000 euros).
It broke the previous record for an item from the Titanic wreck, which was a violin that sold at auction in 2013 for £1.1m. The violin case was sold yesterday Saturday for £360,000 (€420,000) at the Henry Aldridge & Son auction.
Engraved with the initials JJA, the gold pocket watch belonged to American businessman John Jacob Astor, who died at the age of 47 in the sinking of the Titanic in the early hours of April 15, 1912. He was one of the richest men in the world at the time , with a fortune of 87 million dollars that today would correspond to several billions.
Moments after helping his wife Madeline into a lifeboat, John Jacob Astor was seen smoking a cigarette with American author Jack Futrell, according to accounts from surviving passengers.
His lifeless body was found on April 22, 1912. His 14 carat gold pocket watch was found on him.
The history of the watch
After Astor’s body was recovered, these items were sent to his son, Vincent Astor, who fully restored the clock to working order. In 1935, Vincent gave the watch as a christening gift to his young son William Dobbin IV, John Jacob Astor’s executive secretary, according to the auction house.
“The watch was fully restored after it returned to the family” of John Jacob Astor “and was worn by his son,” the auction house said in the presentation. He emphasized that this is “a unique piece of Titanic history and one of the greatest pieces in watchmaking history associated with the most famous ship in the world.”
Aldridge told CNN that the Dobbyn family kept the watch until the late 1990s, when it was put up for auction. An anonymous collector in the United States purchased the watch in this auction and is the current seller. Since then, it has been exhibited in various museums.
“So, you know, over its lifetime, literally millions of people have seen it, which is great,” Aldridge said.
Source: RES-MPE
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