Unique Titanic ticket on display

Originally belonging to the Rev Stuart Holden, a vicar from London, the document is on display in an exhibition at the Merseyside Maritime Museum in Liverpool to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the liner’s sinking.

Mr Holden was set to travel to New York on board the doomed ship but had to pull out the day before it sailed from Southampton on April 10, 1912, because his wife had fallen ill. The lucky priest, who was the vicar of St Paul’s Church in Portman Square, central London, later had his ticket framed and kept it above his desk until his death in 1934.

Rachel Mulhearn, museum director, said the museum did not normally display the ticket owing to its sensitivity to light.