Titanic plea to save letter for home city

The two-page personal note Dr John Edward Simpson wrote to his mother days before the ship sank is due to fetch at least $50,000 dollars (£31,500) when it is sold at a New York auction house at the start of next month.

His relatives, who say they cannot afford to bid for the valuable artefact, desperately want to see it brought back to Simpson’s native Belfast, where the Titanic was built, to be put on museum display.

Fearing it could be snapped up by a private collector and lost from public view forever, they are hoping a benefactor will step in.

“It would be great if a donor or benefactor could be found who would purchase and return it to Northern Ireland for public display,” said his great-nephew Dr John Martin.

According to eyewitnesses who survived the 1912 disaster, Dr Simpson, 37, the assistant surgeon on board, stood with fellow officers on the deck of the stricken vessel as it went down, resigning themselves to their fate, making no attempt to board the lifeboats and instead calmly helped others to safety.

Dr Martin explained that the letter had been passed down through several generations in the family and the plan was always to have it placed in a permanent Titanic exhibition in Belfast.