How an Auction Resurrected the Heroic Violinist of the Titanic

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Wallace Hartley Band Leader of the Titanic and His Violin At Auction

Pamphlet of the deceased band members, published by the Amalgated Musicians Union in 1912. (Picture: Wikimedia Commons, Community domain)

From James Cameron’s 1997 film to the genuine tales of the fated ship’s passengers each wealthy and bad, the RMS Titanic has normally been affiliated with tragic enjoy stories. Among the the lovers divided by the sinking of the well-known ship were being a guy named Wallace Hartley and his fiancée, Maria Robinson. Though Robinson remained at residence in England, Hartley set sail on the Titanic as the ship’s bandmaster. Nevertheless their romance has had a tragic conclude, their tale now life on by way of the afterlife of Hartley’s violin—an engagement reward from his sweetheart—which was auctioned to considerably fanfare in 2013.

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When the younger pair acquired engaged in 1910, Robinson gifted her fiancé with a lavish, German-produced violin. A attractive silver plaque affixed to the instrument read: “For Wallace, on the occasion of our engagement. From Maria.” In 1912, Harley took this sentimental instrument aboard the Titanic as a member of the 8-musician band engaged by the White Star Line. The band was in cost of entertaining the passengers during the short maiden voyage throughout the Atlantic on a supposedly unsinkable ship.

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April 14, 1912 has been remembered as the date of a single of history’s most popular catastrophes. Like Icarus traveling much too near to the sun, the Titanic fell sufferer (in element) to its very own hubris, crashing into an iceberg that might have been avoided with better choice creating. The two hrs and 40 minutes which adopted are potentially a person of the most broadly recognized sequences of occasions in the 20th century. Travellers had been urged to keep on being serene, there had been much too couple of lifeboats, and steering travellers perished disproportionately as their wealthier friends were supplied initially precedence.

Famously, despited all this, the band performed on. Although lots of studies of the sinking have been swiftly dramatized in the press and subsequent retellings, it is extensively agreed that the ship’s modest band less than Hartley’s direction was in reality instructed to participate in on deck. This energy to protect calm was depicted in both of those the 1958 movie A Night time to Keep in mind and the 1997 Titanic. Survivors giving testimony right after the sinking claimed the band played the hymn “Nearer, My God, to Thee.” Many others speculated it may possibly have been a comparable tune termed “Autumn.” As the deck tilted and a distress flair introduced, the band continued to play.

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As depicted in Cameron’s film, it is typically attributed that in the ultimate moments of Hartley’s time on the ship, he advised his bandmates: “Gentlemen, I bid you farewell.” All eight associates died as the ship sank. Only three bodies have been finally recovered. Practically as quickly as the presses began working the stories of survivors, the band’s heroic tranquil and perception of duty started to acquire consideration. The musical rating they selflessly furnished to the disaster unfolding beneath them became a image of the human tragedy of the function. In fictionalized accounts, it has been applied as a distinction to the entitled upper-classes who sat in lifeboats not loaded to capability and who refused to return to research for survivors.

Hartley’s human body was pulled from the h2o 10 times immediately after the Titanic sank. Strapped to the bandleader, the rescuers identified a leather valise with the initials W.H.H. Inside was his violin scenario and treasured instrument, as perfectly as some musical scores. For a long time, the violin was dropped to public awareness. However, upon its resurfacing in 2006, the rest of the sad tale of Hartley and his fiancée has been illuminated.

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On the violin’s emergence from a musician’s attic in 2006, the instrument was the subject of scrutiny by auction house Henry Aldridge & Son and Christian Tennyson-Ekeberg, author of Nearer, Our God, to Thee: The Biography of the Titanic Bandmaster. It was found that in July 1912, a grieved Robinson integrated a telegram receipt in her diary. It go through, “I would be most grateful if you could express my heartfelt many thanks to all who have produced doable the return of my late fiancé’s violin.” Somehow, in the approach of determining and repatriating the useless, the possessions of the late bandmaster ended up returned to England.

Robinson died in 1939. Either before or after her loss of life, the violin was presented to the community Salvation Army. From there, the violin and its origin tale were being relayed to a violin teacher. The teacher then handed it on to an additional female, whose kid later on uncovered the instrument in the attic right after many many years. The reappearance of these types of an vital artifact of Titanic historical past was monumental, but the violin experienced to first be authenticated. As a result of checks of saltwater deposits, inner scans, and exams of the silver plaque, it was confirmed to be the violin Robinson offered to Hartley just about 100 yrs just before.

The terrific promenade deck of the RMS Titanic. (Image: Library of Congress Prints and Images Division)

In 2013, the violin was place up for auction. The violin’s incredible significance to the Titanic‘s record and miasma of mythology built for high anticipations. Its amazing preservation may perhaps in section be owing to the protecting leather-based scenario and valise—which probable floated alongside a lifestyle-jacket-sporting Hartley. Andrew Aldridge, of the auction house, commented, “I can truthfully say I really do not consider any other write-up has made people display as substantially emotion as this a person.”

Whilst other Titanic artifacts have fetched significant charges at auction, the violin established a new record. The relic marketed for approximately $1.6 million to an anonymous purchaser. Before its sale, it was also exhibited to the community in Belfast and other spots. The violin’s reappearance—almost a century just after its creation—once far more shone a mild on the tragic bravery of the Titanic‘s band. They will have to have identified they would not make it on the lifeboats, as people steadily crammed with virtually solely the very first-class travellers.

The Wallace Hartley Memorial in Colne. (Picture: Wikimedia Commons, Public domain)

Hartley was found having taken his important violin, a reward from his fiancée, with him in his previous times. The band leader was rapidly immortalized at household in Colne, Lancashire. His funeral in Could 1912 was attended by 1000’s. A monument with a bust was erected in the city. All the musicians been given a monument in perseverance at Southhampton. It reads, “They died at their posts like gentlemen.”

To understand far more about Hartley and Robinson, various textbooks are out there. Nearer, Our God, to Thee: The Biography of the Titanic Bandmaster by Christian G. Tennyson-Ekeberg addresses Hartley’s lifestyle. And the Band Performed On…: The Titanic Violinist and the Glovemaker: A Real Story of Appreciate, Reduction and Betrayal handles the daily life of bandmate Jock Hume, who was only 21. And The Band that Performed On: The Incredible Story of the 8 Musicians Who Went Down with the Titanic tells the story of the total tragic band.

As horrific as the sinking of the Titanic was, the stories of love and bravery which emerged in the aftermath are frequently told along with the tragedy—a reminder that a historic catastrophe experienced a quite human facet.