One of the most precious relics of the most famous ocean liner in history will go up for auction. This is the gold watch of John Jacob Astor, a businessman and prominent member of the wealthy Astor family, who was last seen alive smoking a cigarette and chatting with another passenger on the deck of the ship as it sank. Astor’s body was found in the icy waters of the Atlantic a week later and, with him, his pocket watch.
What is the watch up for auction
The watch in question is a 14k gold Waltham, engraved with the initials JJA. The watch is expected to fetch between £100,000 and £150,000 when it goes under the hammer at Henry Aldridge & Son auction house in Wiltshire. Astor is believed to have been one of the richest people at the time of the sinking of the Titanic, with a net worth of around $87 million – equivalent to several billion dollars in today’s money.
Astor’s wife however survived the shipwreck. And when her husband’s body was recovered the watch was passed from Astor’s son, Vincent, to the son of his father’s executive secretary, William Dobbyn and has been called “a unique part of the history of the Titanic and one of the most important pieces of the watchmaking history relating to the most famous ship in the world”.
