A lady’s pocket watch recovered from the body of a Danish passenger who perished aboard the Titanic is expected to sell for up to €50,000 (about $66,000) when it goes under the hammer later this month.
Danish second-class passenger Hans Christensen Givard, 27, was among the 1,500 who died when the vessel struck an iceberg in 1912.
Givard was traveling to the United States with two friends—both of whom also died in the disaster.
The watch was found when Givard’s body was recovered from the North Atlantic and he was later buried in Halifax, Canada.
In the pockets were found a savings book, keys, some cash in a wallet, a silver watch, a compass and a passport.
Also recovered was the gilded ladies’ pocket watch, which bears traces of saltwater corrosion.
His belongings were later returned to his brother in Denmark, and it is his descendants who are selling the watch.
The ill-fated story of Givard directly inspired curator Jesper Hjermind and his niece, journalist and U.S. resident Mette Hjermind McCall, to write the book Titanic, De Danske Fortællinger (Titanic, The Danish Stories), in which the pocket watch is mentioned.
Claes Goran Wetterholm, the leading authority globally on the Scandinavian element of the Titanic story, also exhibited it in Copenhagen in 2012.
The watch will be auctioned at Henry Aldridge and Son, of Devizes, Wiltshire, on April 26.
Auctioneer Andrew Aldridge said, “This piece is documented in the official list of Hans’s effects compiled by the authorities in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in the weeks after the Titanic disaster and has remained in his family ever since.
“It was one of the centrepieces of the display of Titanic memorabilia in the Tivoli in Copenhagen in 2012, which illustrates its importance.
“The watch’s movement is frozen in time at the moment the cold North Atlantic waters consumed not only its owner but the most famous ocean liner of all time, Titanic, on April 15, 1912,’’ he added.
NAN
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