FROM a very early age, Millvina Dean's life was tinged with tragedy.

Aged just nine-weeks-old she survived the sinking of the Titanic, then the largest luxury liner ever built.

The "unsinkable" vessel struck an iceberg after setting sail from Southampton on her maiden voyage to New York and slipped below the waves, taking over 1,500 desperate souls with her.

Dean's mother and older brother were also rescued but her father Bertram died in the disaster along with 549 people from Southampton.

The family had been planning to emigrate to the United States and start a new life in Wichita, Kansas, where her father hoped to open a tobacconist shop.

After a stay in New York, Dean and her mother and brother returned to England on board the liner, Adriatic, where she quickly became a celebrity baby in arms.

Dean, who was educated at The Gregg School in Southampton, only learned about the tragedy aged eight when her mother was about to remarry.

Dean herself never married, working for the government during the Second World War drawing maps, and later in the purchasing department of a Southampton engineering firm.

She has attended Titanic-related events across the globe since the wreck was discovered by Dr Robert Ballard in 1985.

Dean, who has lived at Woodlands on the edge of the New Forest for many years, became a celebrity almost overnight and found herself in great demand.

In 1997 she was invited to travel aboard the QE2 to America to complete her family's voyage to Wichita, Kansas.

These days Dean, now aged 95, has been forced to slow down and take things a little more easy but she remains one of only two living survivors of the tragedy.

Name: Millvina Dean FAMOUS FOR: Surviving the Titanic disaster Date of Birth: February 2, 1912 LOCAL LINK: Lives in Woodlands near Ashurst