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Titanic's first-class dinner menu up for auction for £60,000
This menu is the only one known to exist from April 11. Here's what was served on Titanic just days before the disaster.
The first-class dinner menu from the Titanic is up for sale for £60,000. The water-stained menu, dated April 11, 1912, reveals what the passengers ate just days before the ship met its disastrous fate.
According to auction house Henry Aldridge & Son Ltd, this menu was recovered from the body of a Titanic victim named Len Stephenson, who was from Nova Scotia, Canada. Stephenson died in 2017, and the menu was later discovered by his daughter Mary Anita when she went through his stored belongings.
The auction house further informed, "The never-before-seen menu shows the likes of millionaires JJ Astor, Benjamin Guggenheim, Sir Cosmo Duff-Gordon and the 'Unsinkable' Molly Brown indulged in oysters, Squab a la Godard, Spring Lamb, Tournedo of Beef a la Victoria, mallard duck and Apricots Bourdaloue."
This food was served when the vessel had just left its last port of call, Queenstown (Cobh) in Ireland, and was travelling across the Atlantic.
Auctioneer Andrew Aldridge said in a press release, "This is a previously unrecorded menu for the first class restaurant on Titanic. Nobody knew Len Stephenson had it, including his family. After he passed away his possessions were left to his family but they put them into storage. About six months ago his daughter and his son-in-law, Allen, felt the time was right to go through his belongings. As they did they found this menu in an old photo album." (Also Read: Titanic food menus show what three classes of passengers ate on the ship)
He further added, "Len was a very well thought-of historian in Nova Scotia which has strong connections with the Titanic. The body recovery ships were from Nova Scotia and so all the victims were taken back there. Sadly, Len has taken the secret of how he acquired this menu to the grave with him."
Today, only a handful of Titanic menus are known to exist, but those are for the night of the tragedy when passengers had them in their jackets or coat pockets. This menu is the only one known to exist from April 11.
