LONDON: An astonishing eyewitness account of the bravery and stoicism shown by the crew on board the ill-fated Titanic in its final moments before sinking has been put on auction where it is expected to fetch 15,000 pounds.
The letter, written by second officer Charles Lightoller, the most senior surviving officer on board the doomed ship, is going on the auction block later this month, along with an even more valuable letter that was written on the Titanic just days before it broke apart and sank.
Lightoller gives a stunning account of the stoicism and bravery of the crew as they prepared to meet their demise in the frigid waters of the Atlantic Ocean after the liner crashed into an iceberg.
Accepting their impending fate, the men then all shook hands with the officer and said “goodbye old man” before they were washed overboard.
Lightoller was the only member of the group to survive the 1912 disaster, which left around 1,500 people dead, after he was ordered to take command of the last collapsible lifeboat.
As he sailed back to England two weeks after the disaster he wrote a letter of condolence to a colleague of Dr John Simpson, the assistant surgeon on the Titanic, who had been in the group on the boat deck, The Mirror reported.
Lightoller had been sent a letter from the friend desperately seeking news of the medical man.
Written on the White Star Line headed paper of the Adriatic ship, the second officer wrote: “I am sorry to say that Asst. Surgeon John E. Simpson was on the Titanic (not Asst. Purser, as stated in the papers). I deeply regret your loss, which is also mine.”
“I may say I was practically the last man to speak to Dr Simpson, and on this occasion he was walking along the boat deck in company with Mssrs. McElroy, Barker, Dr O’Loughlin and four assistant pursers,” Lightoller wrote.
“They were all perfectly calm in the knowledge that they had done their duty and were still assisting by showing a calm and cool exterior to the passengers,” he wrote.
“Each one individually came up to me and shook hands. We merely exchanged the words ‘Goodbye, old man’,” he says in the letter.
“This occurred shortly before the end and I am not aware that he was seen by anyone after. With deepest sympathy for you in the loss of your friend,” he wrote.
His letter is expected to fetch 15,000 pounds.
Lightoller’s letter is being sold by Titanic specialist auctioneers Henry Aldridge and Son of Devizes, Wiltshire, along with a letter Simpson wrote on Titanic-headed notepaper the day before the ship left Southampton for its ill-fated maiden voyage.
Andrew Aldridge, from the auction house, said of Lightoller’s letter, “(The disaster) is still fresh in his memory and there is a lot of raw emotion that comes out. It is perhaps the best content in a Titanic-related letter that I have seen.” (AGENCIES)
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