Historic Titanic Pocket Watch Sells for Over $2 Million

A gold pocket watch belonging to one of the Titanic’s most famous passengers has just sold at auction for £1.78 million ($2.3 million) at Henry Aldridge & Son Ltd. The 18-carat gold Jules Jurgensen timepiece belonged to Isidor Straus, an American businessman, politician, and owner of the Macy’s department store in New York. Gifted to him by his beloved wife, Ida, on his 43rd birthday in 1888, the watch froze at 2:20 a.m. on April 15, 1912, when the couple tragically submerged with the sinking ship.

Isidor and Ida’s story was portrayed in James Cameron’s Oscar-winning Titanic, showing the couple choosing to remain together as the ship went down. Historical accounts report that Isidor was offered a place on a lifeboat because of his age, but he refused, insisting he wouldn’t board before all women and children were safe. Ida, who had nearly stepped into a lifeboat herself, refused to leave his side, and instead gave her seat and fur coat to her maid. The couple were last seen sitting together on deck chairs, hand in hand, while the chaos around them unfolded.

Isidor’s pocket watch was found with his body, and was returned to his family until the recent auction on November 22. “Pocket watches are incredibly personal items,” said Henry Aldridge & Son’s managing director, Andrew Aldridge. “Every man, woman, and child passenger or crew had a story to tell and they are told 113 years later through the objects that they owned. Items like this keep the story alive and bring us closer to the memory of one of the biggest tragedies of the 20th century.”

The sale set a new record for Titanic memorabilia, coming just a year after another pocket watch—gifted to the captain of the RMS Carpathia by John Jacob Astor’s widow and two other survivors in gratitude for their rescue—fetched £1.175 million ($1.5 million) at the same auction house in April 2024.

A letter Ida Straus mailed from the Titanic, featuring the rare TransAtlantic7 postmark, also sold at the auction for £122,500 ($161,893). The auction also featured a diary recovered from the belongings of Ernest Tomlin, a third class passenger on the ship, which sold for £39,200 ($51,805), and a five-page letter that details his experience on the ship went for £26,950 ($35,619). Aldridge added, “Some of the prices seen at this sale indicate the continued fascination with this amazing story.”

Find out more about the auction on the Henry Aldridge & Son Ltd website.