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A callous letter from the owners of the Titanic asking the grieving family of one victim for the equivalent of £2,000 for the return of his body has sold at auction for £27,000.

The never-seen-before letter from bureaucrats at White Star Line was posted to the distraught family of James Moody, Titanic’s sixth officer, three weeks after the liner sunk with the loss if 1,522 lives in 1912.

His brother Christopher Moody was told in the letter that his sibling’s body could be transported from New York back to his home town of Scarborough at a cost of £20 - more than £2,000 in today’s money.

The charge would cover ‘any expenses and land charges on the other side’.

Typed on headed notepaper, the letter also stated Mr Moody would also be responsible for any further costs that might arise once his brother’s body arrived at either Southampton or Liverpool.

(Image: HAldridgeAuctions/BNPS)

The demands are all the more galling given that White Star Line would have been held accountable for the deaths as there were not enough lifeboats on the Titanic.

The letter came to light after being listed for auction by a collector who acquired it directly from Moody’s family.

It was snapped up by an unnamed buyer for £27,000 at the sale at Henry Aldridge and Son of Devizes, Wilts.

Mr Moody, 24, had been on watch on the ship’s bridge when the luxury liner struck on iceberg in the Atlantic on April 14, 1912. He later helped passengers board the lifeboats, gallantly declining offers to abandon the sinking ship.

He was the only junior officer onboard to die.

The letter, from bosses at Ismay Imrie & Co, the parent company of White Star Line, is dated May 7, 1912.\

Ismay was shown as a cowardly figure in the Leonardo DeCaprio movie Titanic:

It reads: “We have your further letter of the 6th instant, and while we will be prepared to transport the remains of your brother across the Atlantic to either Liverpool or Southampton we regret that it is not possible for us to do any more.

“Should you after further consideration desire the remains of your brother to be returned will you kindly telegraph us in the morning at the same time sending us a deposit of £20 for any expenses and land charges on the other side and we will at once cable New York asking then to arrange this if practicable.

“We also think it right to point out that the arrangements and expenses for taking charge of the remains after arrival of the steamer at Liverpool or Southampton would be on your account.”

Andrew Aldridge, from the auctioneers, said: “The essence of this letter is White Star Line asking for £20, which was a colossal amount of money in 1912, for the return of the body of one of their own officers.

“The mere concept of requiring payment for the return of the body of anyone who died on Titanic - let alone one of the ship’s officers - is just beyond comprehension.

“It is an horrific act on the part of White Star.

“You can’t imagine how Christopher Moody must have felt to have been greeted with a letter like this when he was grieving for the loss of his brother.

(Image: HAldridgeAuctions/BNPS)

“What’s more, the £20 White Star were asking for did not cover getting the body home or to the undertakers once it arrived in England.

“But where this letter is most shocking is the fact that Moody’s body had not been - and never was - recovered in the aftermath.

“When this letter was sent the recovery ships had already arrived in New York and the bodies they had found had been identified and catalogued.

“You would like to think the sending of this letter was an administrative error but it’s open to a lot of interpretation.

“The implications are huge - how many families of the deceased did White Star ask for payment from?

“James Moody was an incredibly brave man, helping to get passengers into liferafts and choosing to stay with the ship until the bitter end.

“It appears that White Star treated his body as a commodity, which callous in the extreme.”

James Moody was born in Scarborough in 1887 and privately educated before joining the crew of White Star Line’s Oceanic.

A promising officer, he transferred to Titanic for the liner’s maiden voyage from Southampton to New York.

It was Moody who answered the call from the ship’s lookout, asking ‘what do you see?’ The reply came back ‘an iceberg, right ahead!’

Moody helped passengers into lifeboats 12, 14, and 16, declining to get in one himself. He was last seen attempting to free a collapsible liferaft from the ship’s deck.