Precious artifacts including a handbag made from alligator skin and tiny vials of perfume that still release a potent scent were recovered from Titanic, the world's most famous shipwreck. It is a secret where the exact location of the warehouse these artifacts are stored in because of their value. All we can say is that it is somewhere in Atlanta, Georgia, in the United States. The BBC was given a rare chance to look around the storage facility and discover the stories behind some of the objects there. An alligator bag and perfume that's potent as ever One of the artifacts retrieved from Titanic is a bag made from alligator skin, which has survived decades in the depths of the North Atlantic. The delicate items inside have been preserved too, revealing details of the life of its owner. 'She was a 63-year-old milliner named Marian Meanwell,' says Tomasina Ray, director of collections for the company that has recovered these artifacts. 'And she was traveling to the US to be with her daughter who was recently widowed.' Among the mementos inside was a faded photograph, thought to be Marian's mother. There was also paperwork she would need for her new life in America, and her medical inspection card, as all third-class passengers needed to prove they weren't bringing disease into the US. But this water-stained document reveals a tragic twist of fate. Marian Meanwell was originally booked on another White Star Line ship called the Majestic. But it didn't sail, so on the card, Majestic is crossed out and her passage shows that she was transferred to the Titanic, where she would become one of 1,500 people to lose their lives. 'Being able to tell her story and have these objects is really important,' says Tomasina. 'Otherwise she's just another name on the list.' Among the items retrieved from the shipwreck were perfume vials belonging to one of the survivors. Tomasina opens a plastic container and a sickly-sweet smell fills the air. 'It's very potent,' she admits. Inside are tiny vials of perfume. They are sealed, but their strong aroma escapes, even after decades on the seafloor. 'There was a perfume salesman on board, and he had over 90 of these little perfume vials,' Tomasina explains. Luxury beyond imagination 'It was like a floating palace, Titanic was supposed to be the most luxurious liner,' says Tomasina. 'So having champagne, having a gym, having all these amenities and these great things for the passengers would have been really important to them.' Little clues: brittle rivets Titanic had advanced safety features for the time and was famously said to be unsinkable. Tomasina shows us some of the ship's rivets, chunky metal pins that held its thick steel plates together. There would have been more than three million of them. 'When Titanic sank, there was a theory that they were using substandard materials perhaps, and that's what caused it to sink faster,' Tomasina explains. Some of these rivets have been tested to see if they contain any impurities. 'There were high concentrations of slag in these, which is a glass-like material that makes them maybe a little bit more brittle in the cold,' she says. 'If these rivets were brittle, and one of the rivet heads popped off more easily, then it could have allowed the seam to open up where the iceberg hit and made it bigger than it otherwise would have been.' Still, we do not know how exactly the ship sank, Tomasina says. 'We're able to help look into the theories, so being able to contribute to the science and that story behind it is something that we're very happy to do.' The class divide What else is there to discover? More room could soon be needed on the shelves of this secret warehouse. The company's latest expedition to the site involved taking millions of images of the wreck to create a detailed 3D scan. As well as surveying the current condition of the Marconi radio room, the team have also been identifying objects in the debris field that they would like to retrieve in future dives. Who knows what they will find and what untold stories each item may reveal about the ill-fated Titanic and its passengers.
