They chose to die together on the Titanic. Now a reminder of their love story is going on sale
By Lianne Kolirin, CNN
(CNN) — Isidor and Ida Straus are remembered as two of the highest-profile victims of the Titanic disaster, and among the few first-class passengers to perish.
The pair, who were depicted in James Cameron’s Oscar-winning 1997 movie “Titanic,” were offered seats in one of the lifeboats but refused to be separated.
The body of Isidor, who co-owned the New York department store Macy’s, was later recovered. His wife’s was never found. Now, well over a century after the world’s most famous maritime disaster, the pocket watch Isidor was wearing at the time has come up for sale.
The gold pocket watch was recovered from Isidor’s body and returned to the couple’s son Jesse. Ida is memorialized on her husband’s grave in New York’s Woodlawn Cemetery.
The watch, which is estimated to fetch up to £1 million ($1.3 million) when it goes on sale on Saturday is engraved with Isidor’s initials and the date February 6, 1888 — the date of his 43rd birthday and the year he and his brother Nathan became full partners in Macy’s.
The watch, described by British auction house Henry Aldridge & Son, which is handling the sale, as “one of the most important and iconic Titanic items ever to be offered for sale,” was passed down the generations of the family before coming up for sale.
In 1997’s “Titanic,” the Strauses, played by Lew Palter and Elsa Raven, were portrayed clutching each other on a bed as the ship went down. In reality the couple, who were travelling home to the United States from their native Germany, were last seen by survivors standing together on deck, holding hands, before they were swept overboard by a wave.
The pair had been directed to lifeboat eight, but Isidor had refused to board while there were younger men barred from boarding, according to documents from the UK’s National Archives. His wife is then said to have also refused, saying: “Where you go, I go.”
The-CNN-Wire
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Lisa Respers France contributed to this report.
