A COLLECTION of stamps has been launched to mark the 100th anniversary of the Titanic disaster – with one featuring the doomed liner’s departure from Southampton.
The commemorative sheet of stamps will be sold from April 10, a century after the ship set sail from the port on its maiden voyage.
The ten first class stamps feature the story of the ill-fated cruise liner, from its construction to the tragedy.
Five postal clerks, including two from Southampton, were among those who died when the ship sank.
James Bertram Williamson and John Richard Jago Smith worked in the ship’s mail area along with three American postal staff.
The mail area was one of the first places to flood after the ship struck an iceberg at 11.40pm on April 14, 1912.
According to a report in The Times from a few days after the disaster: “All five completely disregarded their own safety when the vessel struck and began to carry the 200 sacks of registered mail to the upper deck.
“As the situation became more desperate they appealed to the stewards to assist them and continued their work to the last. All were lost.”
April 15 will mark the 100th anniversary of the day that the cruiser sank in the north Atlantic following a collision with an iceberg.
Its sinking caused the death of more than 1,500 people – 547 of them from Southampton.
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