Mr Julius ("Jules _") Sap

Mr Julius "Jules" Sap, 25, was born in Rek, near Zwevezele, Belgium. He worked farm hand. Like his compatriots Theodore De Mulder and Jean Scheerlinckx, he was heading to assist in the sugar beet campaign near Detroit, Michigan.

He boarded the Titanic at Southampton as a third class passenger (ticket number 345768, £9 10s).

Jules recalled that he was immediately awakened by the impact with the iceberg. He put on his trousers and headed to the deck above. He quickly learned that the Titanic had struck an iceberg and was sinking. Sap stated that he difficulty in finding a lifebelt. Fear gripping him, he freely admitted that he had to threaten someone at knifepoint in order to be given one. Sap stated that there was very little order in the third class area. People were crowding, shoving and trying to understand what to do.

He was probably rescued in lifeboat 11.

After his rescue, Sap and his friends were swindled out of earnings from a travelling show in which they gave accounts of their rescue (see Scheerlinckx).

He stayed in the United States and journeyed to Canada to work as a farm hand near Toronto. In 1914, he returned to Belgium to join the army and served in WW1 as a soldier. He married in 1918 and returned with his wife to America in 1924. He worked on a tobacco plantation in Winnipeg, Manitoba, but living conditions were poor and at his wife's insistence, they returned to Belgium for good the following year. He resumed work as a farm hand, joining the annual sugar beet campaigns in northern France until he retired. Occasionally, he would perform again, telling the Titanic story in cinemas and receiving a commission on admittance fees.

When Sap died on 15th December, 1966, he was the last surviving Belgian passenger who had sailed on the Titanic.

Notes
Frequently listed as "Jules Sop".

Sources
Contract Ticket List, White Star Line 1912 (National Archives, New York; NRAN-21-SDNYCIVCAS-55[279])
Herman De Wulf and Michael A. Findlay (1998) The Belgians and the Titanic. Voyage. #27

References
Michael Findlay Revised Passenger List in Judith Geller Titanic: Women and Children First. Haynes. ISBN 1 85260 594 4

Acknowledgements
Herman DeWulf, Belgium
Michael A. Findlay, USA
Georges Picavet, Belgium
Kassandra Picavet, Belgium