Famous Titanic passenger's pocket watch that stopped at moment doomed ship sank sells for record at auction

Isidor Straus, who was the co-owner of Macy's, brought the watch with him on the ill-fated voyage he was taking with his wife home to New York after a trip to Europe.

"Pocket watches are incredibly personal items," Andrew Aldridge, managing director of Henry Aldridge and Son, where the watch sold last Saturday, said in a statement.

"Every man, woman and child passenger or crew had a story to tell, and they are told 113 years later through the objects that they owned," Aldridge added. "Items like this keep the story alive and bring us closer to the memory of one of the biggest tragedies of the 20th century."

"My place is with you," she reportedly told him. "I have lived with you. I love you, and, if necessary, I shall die with you."

Instead, her maid was shuffled into a lifeboat and given Ida's fur coat to keep warm.

Their love was depicted in James Cameron's Oscar-winning epic "Titanic," showing the couple holding hands in their stateroom bed as the ship went down.

The watch was recovered from his body and returned to his family until this month's auction.

"Some of the prices seen at this sale indicate the continued fascination with this amazing story," Aldridge said.