Mary Roberts survived both the sinking of the Titanic and another maritime disaster two years later.
But now in another twist in her amazing story her luggage - presumed lost to the North Sea off Whitby - has resurfaced almost a century later having been spotted for sale on the auction site eBay a month ago.
The trunk belonging to Mary, who found fame after living through the infamous Titanic disaster in 1912 and then surviving the sinking of the Rohilla in 1914, came to light in a house clearance.
Mary, who was then living in Nottingham, had been a stewardess for White Star Line for several years when she signed up for the Titanic’s maiden voyage.
She left the doomed liner on lifeboat Number 11, helping to look after a small baby until being rescued by the Carpathia. She would later note that the White Star Line stopped her pay at 2.20am, the exact time Titanic sank.
Following a short time of recovery she returned to work at sea, signing on to the HMHS Rohilla as a nurse.
Wednesday 30th October 2013 saw the 99th anniversary of the sinking of the naval hospital ship Rohilla, which saw lifeboat crews battled for fifty hours to pull 144 survivors from the wreck.
As the Rohilla sank Mary Roberts was brought ashore by lifeboat. She was later quoted as saying the Rohilla sinking was worse to endure than the Titanic.
Her trunk, however, had been presumed lost to the North Sea, like so many others, since the steamship smashed against rocks to the west of Saltwick Nab, near Whibty.
But the crucial piece of history has now been recovered by the Whitby lifeboat museum’s Pete Thompson, after he was alerted to it on the online auction site.
Mr Thompson said: “It’s spooky, the fact that I have got this here now, ninety nine years later.
“Mary Roberts carried it on to the Rohilla and then she never saw it again.
“When the sea calmed down the rocks would be crawling with people picking up items and it’s been missing for the last 99 years until it surfaced on eBay for sale a month ago.”
Mr Thompson, a former lifeboat coxswain was not even aware of the antique’s existence until he contacted a friend who happened to mention the trunk.
He said: “If I hadn’t made that phone call I wouldn’t have got it.
“It was an absolute freak of luck. It’s such a coincidence, it’s almost as if the Lord’s looking out for us.”
He contacted the seller, an antiques dealer in Louth, Lincolnshire, who agreed to sell it to the museum for just £50.
Made of tin, with wooden struts, the box had come to light following a house clearance in York earlier this year, but prior to that its history is unknown.
Since purchasing the trunk, Mr Thompson has been in contact with the family of Mary Roberts, who also didn’t know of its existence.
Whereas the Titanic sank in calm water, the weather during the Rohilla disaster was tempestuous, with gales and huge waves battering against the ship as it broke apart.
The Rohilla was travelling to Dunkirk on October 30, 1914, to pick up the wounded, when it struck Whitby Rock in a gale in the early hours, and broke in two.
While most of the 299 people on board were saved in the rescue mission by volunteer RNLI lifeboat crews and the community of Whitby, 85 people died.
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