It’s unlikely that much else from the Titanic’s wreckage will ever return to the surface, although a number of artifacts have been salvaged since the famous ocean liner’s rediscovery in 1985. Now, one of those pieces of history is headed to auction—a hunk of coal originally intended as fuel for the 882-foot-long vessel’s boilers. Along with over 8,000 additional items either directly or indirectly related to another 149 shipwrecks, the coal is slated to go on sale during an upcoming auction beginning on November 6th. But it’s arguably not the oddest find available for purchase.
[Related: The famous railing from ‘Titanic’ has broken off from Titanic.]
The massive archeological trove previously resided at the UK’s Shipwreck Treasure Museum near St. Austell, Cornwall. Although its owners attempted to find a buyer for the institution earlier this year, no one appears ready to shell out the listing’s roughly $2.5 million price tag. Speaking with The Guardian on October 27th, David Lay of Lay’s Auctioneers helped contextualize the significance of his company’s impending event lots, including a length of rope recovered from King Henry VIII’s Tudor flagship, the Mary Rose.
“Virtually nothing that comes from the Mary Rose ever comes on to the market. It’s just so unusual,” Lay said on Sunday.
If bidding at least $6,500 for rope isn’t in your budget, there are hundreds of (comparatively) cheaper pieces to consider for purchase. While not technically from a shipwreck itself, a 1912 first edition of Thomas Russell’s The Sinking of the Titanic—whose front cover already billed it as “The World’s Greatest Sea Disaster”—will begin accepting bids at about $129. Meanwhile, an extremely droopy .38 Smith & Wesson pistol believed to have been aboard the SS Ostend (sunk by a German mine or torpedo in 1943) is estimated to fetch as much as $259. Apart from primary source artifacts, there are also a number of associated items such as various paintings, as well as an original Hans Hass Deco-Brain. Debuted in 1982, the Deco-Brain was billed as the “world’s first solid state dive computer,” and designed to help track the changing depth pressures for scuba-ing.
While not quite as recognizable in pop culture as the Titanic, pieces from another famous 20th century shipwreck are also included in the museum auction—multiple pocket watches recovered from the RMS Lusitania. The British ocean liner sank in 1915 after a German submarine torpedoed it during its 202nd transatlantic crossing, killing 1,197 of the 1,960 passengers and crew members aboard at the time. The deaths of 128 Americans on the Lusitania helped galvanize US support for entering World War I, which it eventually did in 1917.
Much of the Shipwreck Treasure Museum’s collection is reportedly already purchased by other historic institutions, but individual collectors can bid on the remaining lots from November 6-8.
