03-28-2012, 05:12 PM
A Titanic-headed letter by the captain’s personal steward in which he wrote of his fears that the doomed liner was cursed with bad luck is tipped to sell for £36,000.
In his note days before the ship sank, Arthur Paintin said he hoped a near-collision Titanic had with another vessel when it left port was not a sign of things to come.
Chillingly, he also told his parents in England that he expected to be away at sea all summer ‘bar accidents’.
Mr Paintin was very close to Captain Edward Smith and was last seen standing on the bridge next to him moments before the liner sank after hitting an iceberg in 1912.
When the ship docked at Queenstown, Ireland, three days before the disaster, Mr Paintin took the opportunity to post the letter to his parents in Oxford.
In it, he warned of how the Titanic may have been followed by bad luck associated with her sister ship the Olympic, which had accidentally collided with a battleship the year before.
He wrote: 'We have now commenced the quick voyages all the summer (bar accidents).
'I say that because the Olympic’s bad luck seems to have followed us.'
He then gave a detailed account of how the Titanic and the liner the New York nearly collided at Southampton on April 10.
In a well-documented near-miss, the New York slipped her moorings under the pressure of Titanic’s suction, causing it to drift towards the ‘unsinkable’ ship.
much more at link:
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...z1qRr0bZR5
![[Image: article-2121520-125E2E48000005DC-513_308x425.jpg]](http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/03/28/article-2121520-125E2E48000005DC-513_308x425.jpg)
![[Image: article-2121520-125E2F04000005DC-701_636x833.jpg]](http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/03/28/article-2121520-125E2F04000005DC-701_636x833.jpg)
In his note days before the ship sank, Arthur Paintin said he hoped a near-collision Titanic had with another vessel when it left port was not a sign of things to come.
Chillingly, he also told his parents in England that he expected to be away at sea all summer ‘bar accidents’.
Mr Paintin was very close to Captain Edward Smith and was last seen standing on the bridge next to him moments before the liner sank after hitting an iceberg in 1912.
When the ship docked at Queenstown, Ireland, three days before the disaster, Mr Paintin took the opportunity to post the letter to his parents in Oxford.
In it, he warned of how the Titanic may have been followed by bad luck associated with her sister ship the Olympic, which had accidentally collided with a battleship the year before.
He wrote: 'We have now commenced the quick voyages all the summer (bar accidents).
'I say that because the Olympic’s bad luck seems to have followed us.'
He then gave a detailed account of how the Titanic and the liner the New York nearly collided at Southampton on April 10.
In a well-documented near-miss, the New York slipped her moorings under the pressure of Titanic’s suction, causing it to drift towards the ‘unsinkable’ ship.
much more at link:
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...z1qRr0bZR5