[英语阅读]泰坦尼克最后一位幸存者去世

Last Titanic survivor dies in England

“泰坦尼克号”沉船的最后一位幸存者米尔维娜•迪安5月31日在英国一家养老院去世，享年97岁。“泰坦尼克号”豪华邮轮1912年在驶往纽约的途中被冰山一角撞沉时，米尔维娜只有两个月大，是船上年龄最小的乘客。当时，她正随父母移民美国堪萨斯。“泰坦尼克”撞到冰山后，她被装在一条麻袋里跟母亲和哥哥一同获救，而她的父亲却和其他1500多名乘客不幸遇难。去年10月，由于支付不起养老院的费用，米尔维娜被迫拍卖了一些珍贵的沉船纪念品，其中包括一个装满旧衣物的箱子。

Millvina Dean, the last remaining survivor of the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, died Sunday in a care home in England, media reports said. She was 97.

Millvina Dean, the last remaining survivor of the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, died Sunday in a care home in England, media reports said. She was 97.

Elizabeth Gladys Dean, known to friends as Millvina, was only nine weeks old when the liner hit an iceberg in the Atlantic Ocean on the night of April 14, 1912, and sank killing 1,500 people.

She survived after being bundled up in a sack and carried to safety. Her mother Georgette Eva and brother Bertram also made it, but her father, Bertram Frank, was among those who died.

Dean died in a private nursing home near Ashurst in the southern English county of Hampshire, according to the BBC and Britain's domestic Press Association news agency. Staff there refused to comment late Sunday.

Dean's family had boarded the Titanic at Southampton, heading for a new life in Kansas where her father hoped to open a tobacconist shop.

Born on February 12, 1912, Dean was the youngest passenger on board. At the time, RMS Titanic was the most luxurious, most technically advanced and largest passenger liner in the world.

She was dubbed "unsinkable", but it took just two hours and 40 minutes for her to disappear into the icy waters of the Atlantic after striking an iceberg at 11:40 pm on April 14.

Dean was taken back to Southampton with her family after the disaster and did not find out that she had been on board until she was eight years old and her mother was planning to remarry.

According to enthusiasts' website Encyclopedia Titanica (ET), Dean worked for the government as a cartographer during World War II and then for an engineering company.

She told reporters that it was not until the wreckage of the liner was found in 1985 that she suddenly became a celebrity, taking part in documentaries and giving media interviews.

Dean was invited to complete her family's ill-fated journey to the United States in 1997 aboard the QE2, and accepted, although she turned down an offer to attend the premier of the movie "Titanic" because it would be too upsetting.

She moved into a private nursing home in Hampshire after breaking her hip three years ago, and after struggling to pay the bills was forced to sell off some of her memorabilia.

At auction in October 2008 she raised 31,150 pounds (40,000 euros, 53,900 dollars), selling off rare prints of the liner signed by the artists as well as compensation letters sent to her mother by the Titanic Relief Fund.

Dean was also forced to sell a 100-year-old suitcase filled with clothes donated to her family by the people of New York when they arrived after being rescued.

In the wake of the auction, friends including members of the British Titanic Society and the Belfast Titanic Society -- the liner was built in Belfast in Northern Ireland-- set up a campaign to secure her future.

Among the donors to the Millvina Fund were Hollywood actors Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio, who starred in the 1997 "Titanic" film. The pair and the film's director, James Cameron, reportedly donated 30,000 US dollars in total.

The last remaining US survivor, Lillian Asplund, died in her home in May 2006 at the age of 99. She was just five years old when the Titanic went down.