The tale of the 'unlucky mummy'
Frederic K. Seward, a New York lawyer returning from a two-month business trip in Europe, found his way onto a lifeboat when the Titanic began to sink and was among those rescued by the nearby RMS Carpathia. In an interview the following week with The Day of New London, Connecticut, Seward spoke of sharing a saloon table the night the Titanic went down with British journalist and Spiritualism enthusiast W.T. Stead, who regaled his fellow passengers with what The Day characterized as a "hoodoo story":
"Mr. Stead talked much of Spiritualism, though transference and the occult," said Seward. "He told a story of a mummy case in the British museum which, he said, had had amazing adventures, but which pubished with great calamities any person who wrote its story. He told of one person after another who, he said, had come to grief after writing the story and added that, although he knew it, he would never write it. He did not say whether ill luck attached to the mere telling of it."
Resources:
Titanic Timeline
About.com: 20th Century HistoryCargo of Titanic Valued at $420,000
NY Times, 21 April 2012Malignant Mummy Banished by British Sank with the Titanic
Milwaukee Journal, 10 May 1914Weird Misfortunes Blamed on Mummy
NY Times, 7 April 1923Titanic Tour Finds Memories
Associated Press, 5 April 1998The British Museum's Curse Mummy
Darkest London, 20 February 2012The Unlucky Mummy
The British Museum, collections database
Last updated 04/19/12
