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Isidor Straus’s Titanic Pocket Watch Sells for Record £1.78 Million

Documented family provenance drove bidding to a new high for authenticated Titanic artifacts.

The watch of Isidor Straus, recovered from his body after the sinking of the Titanic in 1912.
Image
Isidor Straus and his wife, Ida, victims of the S. S. Titanic sinking. Taken from the memorial program, screened image.

Overview

  • The Henry Aldridge & Son sale in Devizes, Wiltshire, set the record and brought in roughly £3 million across multiple Titanic lots.
  • The 18-carat engraved Jules Jurgensen was a 43rd-birthday gift in 1888, recovered from Straus’s body after the sinking, kept by descendants, and later had its movement restored by great-grandson Kenneth Hollister Straus.
  • The price eclipsed the prior Titanic-memorabilia record of about £1.56 million set last year by another gold watch linked to the Carpathia’s captain.
  • Other results included a letter written by Ida Straus on Titanic stationery at £100,000, a passenger list at £104,000, and a Carpathia crew medal at £86,000.
  • Straus, a Macy’s co-owner who died with his wife Ida in 1912, remains central to Titanic memory, and the watch is currently on exhibit at the Titanic Museum in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.