Titanic violin case to reach £120k at auction

A LEATHER case that protected the violin played by the bandmaster on the Titanic as the ship sank is tipped to sell for £120,000 at auction.

Wallace Hartley and his band are thought to have continued to play after the ship hit the iceberg. Hartley went down with the ship but not before he put his violin back in its bag which he strapped to himself – possibly for buoyancy – using the long handles.

Days later, Hartley’s body was recovered with the bag still attached. The violin and case were returned to Maria Robinson, his fiancee, and donated to the Bridlington Salvation Army band after her death in 1939.

One of its members was a music teacher and they gifted the violin to a pupil in the 1940s, separating it from the bag. The violin was eventually sold at auction for a £1.1million.

The instrument is now on display at the Titanic Belfast museum. The case, which bears Hartley’s initials of WHH, is being sold at auction on April 27 with a guide price of £100,000 to £120,000.

Auctioneer Andrew Aldridge, of Henry Aldridge & Son of Devizes, Wilts, said: “The long straps would have been used by Hartley to strap the bag to himself as the Titanic was sinking. It served to protect the instrument against the salt seawater. The bag was forensically tested and corrosion deposits were recovered from the lock mechanism and metalwork and they were found to be consistent with it having been immersed in seawater.”

He added: “It is a tangible link to the Titanic and represents an integral part of the Hartley violin’s journey from Titanic to the present day.”

The leather case, bearing Wallace Hartley’s initials, was found strapped to the violinist’s body days after the Titanic sank