Lunch Menu From Titanic Auctioned For $88,000

The Titanic's last lunch menu, saved by a first-class passenger who escaped the sinking liner, has been sold by a New York auction house for $88,000 (£58,000).

Abraham Lincoln Salomon survived the disaster by boarding a lifeboat whose crew were said to have been bribed to row away instead of rescuing more people.

His menu lists such savoury snacks as Chicken a la Maryland, Virginia Ham and Soused Herrings.

It is signed on the back in pencil by first-class passenger Isaac Gerald Frauenthal, who escaped on another lifeboat.

The menu is printed with the date 14 April 1912, the day the ocean liner hit an iceberg and began sinking.

Mr Frauenthal and Mr Salomon are thought to have lunched together that day.

Also in the so-called Lifeboat One were aristocratic fashion designer Lucy Duff-Gordon and her Scottish husband, Lord Cosmo Duff-Gordon.

Mr Duff-Gordon was accused of bribing the crew to row the passengers to safety in the vessel, which had 12 aboard, but a capacity of 40.

The Duff-Gordons were cleared by the British Wreck Commissioner's inquiry.

But the investigation did find others might have been saved if the boat had turned around.

At Wednesday's sale of Titanic artefacts, auctioneer Lion Heart Autographs also sold Mr Salomon's printed ticket from the Titanic's opulent Turkish baths.

One of four such tickets known to exist, it went for $11,000 (£7,266).

A letter written six months after the disaster to stationery business owner Mr Salomon fetched $7,500 (£4,954).

"I am afraid our nerves are still bad," wrote Mabel Francatelli, who also escaped in Lifeboat One, "as we had such trouble & anxiety added to our already awful experience by the very unjust inquiry when we arrived in London."

Lion Heart Autographs said the items had been passed down to the seller by a descendent of one of the lifeboat survivors.

It did not identify the buyers.