Millvina Dean was just an infant when the Titanic struck an iceberg and sunk to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.
GERRY PENNY/AFP/GettyMillvina Dean in 2002 at a Titanic exhibit opening.
Millvina Dean was once the last living survivor of the tragic Titanic disaster of 1912. At only two months old, Dean traversed across the Atlanic onboard the ill-fated cruise liner with her mother, father, and brother. The disaster resulted in the death of her father, a loss that she would carry with her for the rest of her life.
After making a public statement at a Titanic event, news outlets began interviewing Dean about her experience. For the remainder of her life, Dean gave interviews, appeared in documentaries, and attended conferences about the Titanic.
This is her story.
Millvina Dean’s Perilous Journey Across The Atlantic As An Infant
TODAYMillvina Dean as an infant in her mother’s arms.
Millvina Dean was born on February 2, 1912. Two months later, she boarded a passenger ship with her mother, father, and older brother Bertram. The ship was the doomed RMS Titanic, captioned by Edward Smith and she was the youngest passenger and last survivor of the disaster, which occurred on April 15, 1912.
She was born in Branscombe, England, and shortly after, her family decided to emigrate to Wichita, Kansas, to find work with some of her father’s relatives, who had emigrated earlier. The Dean family boarded the Titanic at Southampton, England as third-class passengers after a coal strike prevented them from boarding their original ship.
On the night of April 14th, her father felt the collision and sent her mother and the children up to the deck. Dean and her mother sat in Lifeboat 10 and were among the first third-class passengers to escape the sinking ship. Crew loaded infant Dean into a mail sack and placed her in a lifeboat. Luckily, they arrived safely in New York four days later. Unfortunately, her father died on the Titanic and his body was never recovered.
Originally, her mother planned to remain in America and continue living the life her father had planned for them when they set out on their journey.
However, after just two weeks of facing the stress of raising two children alone in a foreign country, her mother decided to return to England and not continue on to Kansas. The three of them set sail back home aboard the ship Adriatic. As the youngest passenger of the Titanic, she gained lots of attention and media publicity on her trip back to England.
“[She] was the pet of the liner during the voyage, and so keen was the rivalry between women to nurse this lovable mite of humanity that one of the officers decreed that first and second class passengers might hold her in turn for no more than 10 minutes,” the Daily Mirror reported on May 12, 1912, according to The Washington Post.
Life In The Spotlight
PETER MUHLY/AFP/Getty ImagesA Titanic postcard signed by survivors Eva Hart, Beatrice Sandstrom, and Bertam and Millvina Dean is shown on display at the Ulster Transport Museum in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
She and her brother went to school with the money from a Titanic survivors fund. It wasn’t until she was eight years old that Dean became aware that she had even been a passenger on the ship.
During World War Two, Dean was a cartographer for the British government. She also worked in the purchasing department of an engineering firm until her retirement in 1972. Although she never married, she did have a life-long companion named Bruno Nordmanis.
She was under the public’s radar for years until she attended her first public speaking event in the 1980s.
“Nobody knew about me and the Titanic, to be honest, nobody took any interest, so I took no interest either,” she said. “But then they found the wreck, and after they found the wreck, they found me,” she stated to The New York Times.
After this, Dean became very active in Titanic commemoration events. She attended several conventions and exhibits throughout the United States and Canada, as well as gave many radio and television interviews and appeared in documentaries.
Despite her involvement in the Titanic community, she reportedly refused to watch many depictions of the event, including James Cameron’s 1997 Titanic.
“Although I don’t remember [my father], know nothing about him, I would still be emotional,” she told The Irish Times in an interview. “I’d be thinking: ‘How did he go down? Did he go down with the ship? Did he jump overboard?'”
The Legacy Of Millvina Dean, The Last Titanic Survivor
Millvina Dean officially became the final remaining Titanic survivor after Barbara West Dainton, the second to last survivor, died in 2007 at the age of 96.
Her brother, Bertram Dean Jr., who was also on the Titanic, died on the 80th anniversary of the sinking.
In 2008, Dean publicly announced that she was selling several of her Titanic mementos to pay for the nursing home she lived in, including the mail sack she was likely placed in during the disaster. The sale raised nearly $54,000.
And, until her death, Millvina continued to attend events and speak about the Titanic.
FacebookMillvina Dean posing with an actor at the Titanic Museum Attraction shortly before her death.
Millvina Dean died of pneumonia in 2009 on the 97th anniversary of the Titanic’s departure from the Southampton port. She was survived by two nephews and two nieces.
Her companion Bruno Normandis scattered her ashes from the docks in Southampton, where her family had originally boarded the Titanic.
When journalists from The New York Times asked Dean shortly before her death if she believed fate or divine providence put her on the Titanic, allowed her to survive, and then allowed her to outlive all of the other passengers, Dean simply stated:
“Heaven and hell, how can you believe in something up in the sky?” she said smiling. “Still, I’d love to be proved wrong.”
Next, check out these rare Titanic photos from before and after the sinking. Then, take a look at these Titanic facts we bet you’ve never heard before.
