The Last Titanic Letter
It captured pleasant moments before the epic disaster.
If you’d prefer to listen instead of read:
I have always had a morbid fascination with the tragic April 14, 1912 sinking of the RMS Titanic in which more than 1,500 lives were lost. Even though it happened 38 years before I was born, the date is the same as my birth date, and I read Sir Walter Lord’s A Night to Remember at an impressionable age.
So I was amazed to learn about the last known surviving letter written on ship stationery the afternoon of the disaster. It was penned by 2nd class passenger Esther Hart to her mother in east London, with a note at the end from her 7-year-old daughter Eva. They were traveling with Esther’s husband, Benjamin, to begin a new life in North America.
The letter gives us a glimpse of a pleasant Sunday afternoon aboard the elegant ship.
"Well, the sailors say we have had a wonderful passage up to now. There has been no tempest, but God knows what it must be when there is one."
The only reason the letter survived is because Benjamin placed it in a pocket of his sheepskin-lined coat to be mailed later. In just a few hours—after the ship had struck an iceberg and was sinking fast—Benjamin handed the coat to his wife for warmth as he put her and their daughter into a lifeboat. She discovered it after they were rescued by RMS Carpathia. Her husband’s body was never identified.
In 2014, the letter brought almost £170,000 ($200,000) at auction by Henry Aldridge and Son (U.K.).
CLICK HERE for images and a transcript of the entire letter.
Every so often, I’ll open the envelope of a letter from the past—revealing how a few written words can echo across generations and showcasing how these messages continue to inspire, move, and connect us today.
Food for thought
“Writing a lot of letters will not turn you into Lincoln or Shakespeare, but if you do it enough, you begin to put your essential self on paper whether you mean to or not. No other form of communication yet invented seems to encourage or support that revelatory intimacy.”
~ Malcolm Jones, “The History and Lost Art of Letter Writing” (Newsweek)
Spotlight on good work
—through her publication “”—is helping hundreds of entrepreneurs—especially those with primarily online businesses—navigate the confusing intersection of Technology and Marketing to increase their visibility and their chances of being “found” by their target audience. I am a proud member of her Visibility Edge Alliance, a paid membership that is both mastermind and group coaching experience. For years now, I have turned to Denise for trusted guidance on using and leveraging everything from email to artificial intelligence. 
Don’t miss the fun in our Facebook group
Easter, Spring, flowers, and so much more…the note-writing enthusiasts in our group are sharing all kinds of fun ways to liven up your notes and letters, on both the inside and the outside. Come join us…it’s free, but private so we can share best practices for sensitive note-writing situations. The Art of the Heartspoken Note.
Coming up…
Next week’s post will be on Earth Day. I’ll share lots of ways to use your note and letter-writing skills to celebrate our reverence for the natural world around us.
Have a great week, and always remember: whether written or spoken,
words from the heart will never fail you!
That's an amazing story and a precious letter to have survived. Thanks for sharing the story, Elizabeth. And many thanks for the kind words you share about my work. It's a gift to me to have worked with you for so many years. 🥰
The story behind the letter makes the letter even more precious. Incredible.