Historical : The Titanic Violin

How ultimate symbol of courage in the face of disaster sparked auction bidding frenzy: Titanic tale of violin playing as the ship went down - and sold yesterday for £1,185,000. Wallace Hartley 'struck up Nearer My God To Thee to calm passengers'

Was inscribed 'For Wallace on the occasion of our engagement from Maria'. She paid £40 for the instrument in 1910, the equivalent of £2,630 today. Sold at auction in Wiltshire for more than £ m to British Titanic 'connoisseur'. Even amid the tumult, his last words are said to have resounded clearly. 'Gentlemen, I bid you farewell.'

With that, Wallace Hartley, bandleader of the Titanic, was washed away - with his precious violin, in its case, strapped to his waist. Folklore has it that, moments earlier, in an incredible act of stoicism, he struck up the hymn Nearer My God To Thee to calm passengers as the doomed liner slid beneath the icy waters of the North Atlantic. 

Perhaps the story has been embellished a little over the years since. Certainly it is one of the most memorable scenes from the James Cameron's 1997 film Titanic. 

Yesterday, Mr Hartley's story reached its extraordinary conclusion in the sleepy Wiltshire town of Devizes. There, his precious violin - which memorabilia hunters regarded as something of a Holy Grail and assumed had been lost forever - was sold at auction for more than £1 million to a British Titanic 'connoisseur'.

Hartley and his seven fellow band members all died in the tragedy in 1912. Their bodies were recovered two weeks later.

A gift from Hartley's fiancee Maria Robinson, the violin was inscribed 'For WALLACE on the occasion of our engagement from MARIA'.

Wallace was the son of a humble Lancashire choirmaster but Miss Robinson, 32, was a woman 'of private means' - the daughter of a wealthy cloth manufacturer. She paid around £40 for the violin in 1910, the equivalent of £2,630 today.

The fate of Hartley's violin has always been a mystery to Titanic scholars. The bodies of the band leader and two other musicians were pulled from the water by a search crew from the CS Mackay-Bennett and taken to Nova Scotia, Canada.

Violinist John Law Hume from Dumfries in Scotland and bass player John Frederick Preston Clarke from Liverpool were laid to rest in Halifax but Hartley's body was repatriated to England and buried at Colne, Lancashire, the town where he was born and raised.

The Titanic pictured as it departs Southampton, England on its maiden Atlantic voyage

Newspapers at the time reported that Hartley was found fully dressed with his violin strapped to his chest. However, when the effects of Body 224 were itemised by The Office of the Provincial Secretary in Nova Scotia, there was no mention of it.

Other than his clothes and spare change, he had only a ring, a pen, a silver matchbox, a gold cigar holder, a watch and chain, a collar stud, a pair of scissors and two pieces of correspondence. It was not among the possessions handed back to his father Albion Hartley, who collected the body from the ship The Arabic at Liverpool docks. The assumption has long been that the instrument was spirited away by someone involved in collecting the corpses.

So when the violin re-emerged in 2006 - it was found in an attic in North Yorkshire - its rediscovery prompted feverish debate over its authenticity.

'The story involves love, bravery and religion'

Titanic specialist auctioneers Henry Aldridge & Son insist that nearly seven subsequent years of research and tests have proved it to be the genuine article.

For while the violin was never included on any official inventory, it had indeed been recovered. This was because Maria, devastated at Wallace's death, wrote to the authorities explaining its sentimental importance and asking for it to be sent directly back to her.

The draft of her subsequent thank-you letter to the authorities in Maria Robinson's diary reads: 'I would be most grateful if you could convey my heartfelt thanks to all who have made possible the return of my late fiance's violin. 

'May I take this opportunity to express my appreciation to you personally for your gracious intervention on my behalf.'

INSCRIPTION: The violin was a present to Wallace Hartley from his fiancee Maria (right)

Steve Turner, author of The Band That Played On, which tells the story of 33-year-old Hartley and the Titanic's band said: 'The story behind the violin involves love as it was a gift from his fiancee. And it of course symbolises bravery and religion.

He added: 'It sums up all that you would like to believe from the tragedy. You can't imagine anything more iconic.'

He added: 'Because the violin was a gift from Maria to Wallace on their engagement, it makes sense that she was the rightful heir rather than Hartley's parents. I wonder whether Hartley clung on to it so tightly because it was a gift from his wife-to-be. Otherwise he might just have let it go.'

The violin remained Maria's most treasured possession and she never married. On her death in 1939, it was passed to her sister Margaret Robinson who in turn donated it to the Salvation Army at Bridlington, East Yorkshire.

'It was never about the money with him'

'Then it was passed to a Salvation Army music teacher who played the violin. She passed it to one of her pupils called Eve, who held on to it until she died in the 1980s,' said Mr Turner. 'When her son, a lecturer, came to clear out her loft he fondly remembered playing it as a youth and put it in his own attic.'

There it remained until 2006 when, unaware of its provenance, he began to wonder whether 'it might be worth something' and asked an expert to 'cast an eye over it'.

By the time the experts arrived at his modest three-bedroom bunglaow, he had already worked out that it was 'Titanic related' and 'might be of interest'.

But in an yet another twist it emerged yesterday that the lecturer, who has not being named, died two months ago. 'His family has become the main beneficiary,' said Mr Turner. 'He wanted a lot of the money to go to charity. 

'It was never about the money with him, though, as he would have sold it years ago. 

In yesterday's auction, the violin had a reserve price of between £200,000 and £300,000 and was expected to reach as much as £400,000. About 200 people packed out the sale room in the hope of capturing a piece of history. Many stood at the back of the room as there were not enough chairs.

In the film, Jonathan Evans-Jones playing Wallace Hartley says "Gentlemen it has been a privilege"

Within a couple of minutes, bidding had broken £100,000 and soon passed the £220,000 world record for Titanic memorabilia as the competition between four telephone bidders hotted up. There were gasps from the audience as the price reached £350,000 and then raced upwards to £600,000.

The room fell silent when bidding hit £750,000.

The violin eventually sold for £900,000 (£1,185,000 once commission and VAT were added) after fierce bidding between two telephone bidders. Selling the violin had taken just ten minutes.

Auctioneer Andrew Aldridge said the 'ecstatic' new owner was British. 'He is a very knowledgeable Titanic connoisseur. 

'He will enjoy it and probably put it on public display in the future. He's a very successful individual.'

The violin has been on exhibition since May at Titanic Branson and Titanic Pigeon Forge in the United States where more than 315,000 viewed it and later at Titanic Belfast, the award-winning visitor attraction in Northern Ireland.

Evans-Jones plays band leader Hartley in James Cameron's 1997 blockbuster

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