Millvina Dean was just two months old in 1912 when the Titanic struck an iceberg and sank to the bottom of the Atlantic — and she lived to the age of 97 before dying in 2009.
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 journeyed across the Atlantic 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 the wreck of the Titanic was discovered in 1985, 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, The Youngest Titanic Survivor
Personal photoMillvina Dean as an infant in her mother’s arms.
Millvina Dean was born on Feb. 2, 1912 in Branscombe, England. Shortly after Millvina’s birth, her family decided to emigrate to Wichita, Kansas to find work with some of her father’s relatives, who had emigrated earlier.
When a coal strike fatefully prevented them from boarding their original ship, Millvina, her mother, her father, and her older brother Bertram boarded a passenger ship in Southampton, England as third-class passengers on April 10, 1912.
That ship was the doomed RMS Titanic, captained by Edward Smith. Not only was Millvina the ship’s youngest passenger at just nine weeks old, she would also be the last survivor after it sank on April 15.
Millvina Dean’s Perilous Journey Across The Atlantic
On the night of April 14, 1912, the Titanic struck an iceberg. Millvina Dean’s father felt the impact and sent her mother and the children up to the deck to seek safety.
Because he had responded so quickly, Millvina, her mother, and her brother were among the first passengers to evacuate. Baby Millvina was placed in a canvas mail sack and lowered down into Lifeboat 10.
Luckily, they arrived safely in New York four days later. But Millvina’s father tragically died on the Titanic. His body was never identified.
Originally, Millvina Dean’s mother planned to remain in America and continue living the life her husband 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, Millvina 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 Independent.
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.
Millvina Dean and her brother went to school with the money from a Titanic survivors fund. Because she was too young to remember the tragedy, 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 II, Dean became 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 flew under the public’s radar for years, rarely speaking of the disaster that defined her childhood. Then, in the 1980s, the discovery of the ship’s wreck sparked a new wave of interest in the Titanic and its survivors.
“Nobody knew about me and the Titanic, to be honest, nobody took any interest, so I took no interest either,” she told The New York Times. “But then they found the wreck, and after they found the wreck, they found me.”
After this, Dean became very active in Titanic commemoration events. She attended several conventions and exhibits throughout the United States and Canada, gave countless radio and television interviews, and appeared in documentaries on the subject.
Despite her involvement in the Titanic community, she reportedly refused to watch James Cameron’s 1997 Titanic film because she feared it would force her to imagine her father’s final moments.
“Although I don’t remember him, know nothing about him, I would still be emotional,” she told The Irish Times in a 2009 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 ship’s collision with the iceberg.
In 2008, Millvina Dean again made international headlines when she announced that she was selling several of her Titanic mementos to pay for the nursing home she lived in, including a canvas sack her mother used to carry the family’s belongings while living in New York. The sale raised nearly $54,000. Later, Kate Winslet, Leonardo DiCaprio, and James Cameron contributed to the fund after learning about Dean’s financial struggles.
And, until her death, Dean continued to attend events and speak about the Titanic.
Titanic Museum Attraction/FacebookMillvina Dean posing with an actor at the Titanic Museum Attraction shortly before her death.
Millvina Dean died of pneumonia on May 31, 2009, on the 98th anniversary of the Titanic’s launching. She was survived by two nephews and two nieces.
Her companion, Bruno Nordmanis, scattered her ashes from the docks of 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, smiling:
“Heaven and hell, how can you believe in something up in the sky? 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.
