Secret treasure from Titanic up for grabs

By Staff

Saturday, March 29, 2008, 9:49

A Titanic victim's pocket watch, which stopped as he breathed his last, is a part of the secret treasure from the tragedy that is maintained by his daughter. Lillian Asplund, the last Titanic survivor with memories of the disaster, kept the timepiece, stuck at 2.19am. Her collection also includes a ticket for the doomed voyage, one of only four left in the world.

Besides these, her collection also comprises poignant family photos and wedding rings. After Lillian's death, her collection is being auctioned by Titanic specialist auctioneers Henry Aldridge and Sons of Devizes, Wilts. The collection is expected to fetch 150,000 pounds at the auction next month.

'The importance of this archive cannot be underestimated,' British tabloid The Sun quoted the company's Andrew Aldridge as saying. Lillian was just five on April 14, 1912 when the tragedy claimed 1,500 lives, including that of her father Carl and three brothers.

Carl first decided that all of them should die together, but Lillian and her younger brother Felix, three at that time, were thrown into a lifeboat by a stranger at the last moment. Carl, who pushed his wife Selma forward to go with them, drowned. His frozen body was recovered from the Atlantic 12 days later, with the ticket and pocket watch.

However, his three sons were never found. Lillian kept her possessions locked away in a shoebox in her desk, and did not even tell her family about them. Lillian is only outlived by a woman who was a baby at the time of the disaster.