Record selling price for the gold watch of the richest passenger on the Titanic

The gold watch of John Jacob Astor IV - a member of the Astor tycoon family in the US and the richest person on the Titanic - was sold for nearly 1.5 million USD on April 27, according to CNN.

John Jacob Astor IV's gold watch. (Photo: CorinMesser/BNPS/MEGA).

At the auction on April 27, Henry Aldridge & Son auction house in the town of Devizes (Wiltshire, England) sold the above watch to a private collector in the US for a record price of 1.175 million pounds. UK (nearly 1.5 million USD).

This is a selling price 10 times higher than the expected price, helping the watch set a new world record for memorabilia related to the Titanic.

The owner of the watch is American businessman John Jacob Astor IV. He was one of 1,500 people killed when the Titanic sank on April 15, 1912. His body and gold watch were found 7 days after the historic tragedy.

Vincent Astor - son of John Jacob Astor IV - repaired the watch, carried it with him for decades and then gave it to the son of William Dobbyn IV - his father's secretary - before auctioning it off.

According to Andrew Aldridge - chief executive officer at Henry Aldridge & Son, Mr. Astor was one of the richest people in the world at the time the Titanic crashed, possessing a net worth of $87 million - equivalent to several billion dollars. Nowadays.