PREMONITIONS of doom were never very far from Titanic, even before the fateful collision.

One of the most famous stories is of the novel Futility, penned by American author Morgan Robertson who, a full nine years before the event, was writing about a British ship which sailed during April, around the same size and length of the Titanic, the same capacity, same speed, and damaged on the same side by an iceberg before sinking with great loss of life due to lack of lifeboats.

But plenty of other people had a bad feeling about the Titanic and one of them was Alfred Head, whose brother, Norman, of Avenue Road, Walkford, gave an interview to the Daily Echo in 1979.

Alfred had signed on as a fireman but, said Norman: “He didn’t want to sail in her.

“He had a feeling it might sink and walked off.”

However, his colleagues got him drunk and whisked him back on board again and: “When he sobered up he was at sea.”

Poor Alfred perished in the sinking but because of the way he’d joined the ship, he’d left his seaman’s chest behind which was delivered to Norman’s mother with his clothes still in it which she kept until she died.

“It’s the last link with my brother,” said Norman who hoped the chest would go to a museum.