Convicted fraudster Anthony Marshall has been caught in yet another scam — this time trying to sell off a century-old Astor family heirloom that’s actually a phony, The Post has learned.
Marshall, who was convicted in 2009 of conspiring to steal $60 million from his mother, Brooke Astor, has been hawking a gold pocket watch that he says his grandfather John Jacob Astor IV wore when he died on the Titanic in 1912, sources said.
Anthony Marshall with wife Catherine (Daniel Shapiro)
(Daniel Shapiro)
TICKER TALE: This watch (above) is certified as the one worn by John Jacob Astor (bottom right) on the Titanic, despite claims by fraudster Anthony Marshall (left, with wife Charlene) that his is the real deal. (
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The timepiece does exist — but it was purchased by a West Coast developer in 1997, and he’s got the documents to prove it.
“I wasn’t surprised. I had heard about somebody who was claiming to have the Astor watch from the Titanic. He has a different watch,” John Miottel, a real-estate magnate who collects luxury ocean-liner memorabilia, said yesterday from California.
Marshall, 88 — free while appealing his one- to three-year prison sentence — turned heads at a black-tie gala for the Titanic II cruise ship last month at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum when he bragged that he was wearing the timepiece, The Post’s Page Six exclusively reported.
He claimed at the celebration that he was trying to sell the watch — with John Jacob’s initials on the back — and could make about $1 million.
But Miottel claims Marshall was just pulling another ruse.
“The watch was purchased in 1907 and carried by Mr. Astor, and we have an affidavit on its history. When the ship went down, Astor went into the water and two weeks later, they recovered his body and the personal effects were taken off the victims and put in canvas bags,” said Miottel, who provided documents showing he bought the watch from Brunk Auctions in Asheville, NC.
After the Titanic sunk, John Jacob Astor’s body and his belongings were shipped to Nova Scotia, where his grieving son Vincent arrived a few weeks later to pick everything up, Miottel explained.
Vincent wore the watch for years, but eventually gave it and accompanying cuff links to a godson, William A. Dobbyn V.
Dobbyn’s wife, Elizabeth, certified that “the gold watch and cuff links . . . [were] a gift to my late husband from John Jacob Astor’s son Vincent, who stood as godfather for my husband at his christening in 1935,” in a letter signed by the auction house and dated 1997.
“My husband was told by Vincent Astor that the watch had been carried by John Jacob Astor when [he] perished with the sinking of the Titanic . . . and was recovered with his body,” the letter reads, adding that her husband’s father was “executive secretary” to John Jacob Astor and the family until he retired in 1924.
It remained in the Dobbyn family until Elizabeth auctioned it.
Marshall insists his watch is the real deal, according to his wife, Charlene.
“I’ve heard that story [that Miottel owns the original] and it’s not true,” Charlene Marshall said in a phone interview.
Sources said that Charlene was also sporting family heirlooms at the soiree, wearing jewels that belonged to Brooke Astor.
Additional reporting by Bob Fredericks