Titanic artifacts often fetch pretty impressive prices at auction, and that was certainly the case with one seemingly modest pocket watch. The golden timepiece in question belonged to John Jacob Astor, one of Titanic’s richest passengers, and it just sold for $1.5 million.
The auction took place at Henry Aldridge & Son in Devizes, Wiltshire last week, and featured many impressive pieces of Titanic memorabilia. The case of the violin belonging to the bandleader Wallace Hartley and a pocketbook detailing the Titanic’s voyages also fetched impressive prices, but none of them compares to Astor’s watch.
Astor went down with the ship at the age of 47, after putting his wife Madeleine on a lifeboat. He was a successful businessman and one of the richest passengers aboard the RMS Titanic, with a net worth of roughly $87 million, equivalent to $2.75 billion today.
The golden watch with his initials was eventually recovered from his body and was expected to sell for about $189,000 at auction. It exceeded everyone’s expectations and became one of the highest-selling items from Titanic at $1.5 million.
According to the auctioneer Andrew Aldridge, the prices fetched at this sale were absolutely incredible cause “they reflect not only the importance of the artifacts themselves and their rarity but they also show the enduring appeal and fascination with the Titanic story.”