It has been 102 years since it was written on board the Titanic, describing a pleasant Sunday spent on the cruise ship that was headed for disaster. The letter fetched 119,000 pounds (about $200,000) at auction in England Saturday, surpassing expectations by $30,000.
"Well, the sailors say we have had a wonderful passage up to now," the letter from a passenger to her mother reads in part. "There has been no tempest, but God knows what it must be when there is one."
The unique artifact is believed to be the the only surviving letter written aboard the doomed ship on April 14, the day the Titanic hit an iceberg. More than 1,500 people lost their lives when the ship sank.
From London, Larry Miller reports for NPR's Newscast unit:
"The letter on Titanic stationary was written by survivors Esther Hart and her 7-year-old daughter, Eva, eight hours before the Titanic hit a North Atlantic iceberg and sank.
"Addressed to Hart's mother in England, she wrote they were enjoying the wonderful journey, that she was over her sea sickness, that she had gone to church service that Sunday morning and enjoyed the hymns.
"She wrote the ship was moving so fast they'd be arriving in New York early. The letter survived because it was in the pocket of her husband's coat, which he gave her to keep warm before the Titanic sank. While mother and daughter made it to a lifeboat, Hart's husband went down with the ship.
"Also at the auction: a Titanic second-class menu and a metal plate from a lifeboat."