Titanic passenger’s chilling account of survival, written in letter, sells for record ₹3.35 crore at UK auction
A letter penned by Colonel Archibald Gracie days before the Titanic sank has fetched a record price at a UK auction.
A letter written by a Titanic passenger just days before the ship sank has been sold for a record-breaking ₹3.35 crore (£300,000) at an auction in the UK, reported BBC.
The letter, penned by Colonel Archibald Gracie, was purchased by an anonymous buyer at Henry Aldridge and Son auction house in Wiltshire on Sunday. It sold for five times the amount it was expected to fetch, as it was earlier valued at around ₹67 lakh (£60,000).
Described as “prophetic,” the letter captures Col Gracie telling an acquaintance he would “await my journey’s end” before passing judgment on the “fine ship.”
Dated 10 April 1912, the day he boarded the Titanic in Southampton, the letter was written five days before the ship sank after colliding with an iceberg in the North Atlantic.
Col Gracie was among the approximately 2,200 passengers and crew on board the Titanic during its ill-fated voyage to New York. Over 1,500 people lost their lives in the disaster.
A first-class passenger, Gracie wrote the letter from his cabin, C51. It was later posted when the Titanic made a stop at Queenstown, Ireland, on 11 April 1912, and was also postmarked London on 12 April.
Sets new record
According to the auctioneer, the letter fetched the highest price ever paid for any correspondence written on board the Titanic.
Col Gracie’s account of the sinking is one of the most well-known narratives from the tragedy. He later authored The Truth About The Titanic, a book that recounts his harrowing experience aboard the doomed ocean liner.
In his writings, he detailed how he survived the disaster by clambering onto an overturned lifeboat in the freezing waters. He noted that more than half the men who initially made it to the lifeboat eventually died from exhaustion or cold.
Although Gracie survived the sinking, the injuries and hypothermia he suffered took a toll on his health. He fell into a coma on 2 December 1912 and died two days later from complications related to diabetes.
