The lives of a lower-fare class were seemingly held more cheaply than the millionaire class above them. Many versus the few. The rich against the poor. The underclass versus the upper class.

However, if we look more closely at the fares, it’s not as simple as the bigger your wallet the better your chances of survival. The White Star Line also sold Second Class tickets. At £12, the ticket class afforded a little more comfort than your entry fare, somewhere between Steerage and First.

It was the “premium economy” class of the 1910s.

However, compared to a Steerage Class passenger, those splashing out on a Second Class fare could actually have lowered their chances of survival.

Of the 168 men holding Second Class fares, only 14 survived. Less than one in 10.

This compared to 16 per cent survival rate for men holding Steerage Class tickets

Women and children first? 

So what accounts for the discrepancy between the rates?

The biggest factor in survival rate was not fare class, or being closest to the life rafts, but it was to do with an order from the bridge.

Captain Edward Smith’s order to load the lifeboats “women and children first” sealed the fate of many.

In the 1997 film, Kate Winslett’s character Rose had many socioeconomic advantages over love interest Jack - however, she had one key when it came to lifeboats.

As a woman holding a First Class fare, she was among the safest of passengers.

Of the 144 First Class women aboard, 140 survived. A 97 per cent survival rate. This was comparable to the Second Class fares, where 80 out of 93 female passengers survived.

“Women and children first” was a seemingly clear plan that led to confusion. Instead of allowing women and children to board the lifeboats first, and fill remaining seats with men - it was taken to mean men would only be evacuated when all women and children were disembarked.

Due to the fact that the 20 lifeboats were to be lowered from the top deck, and had to be filled one at a time, many were launched with empty seats.

Despite having room for 65 people each, the first boat carried just 12 passengers.

This vastly reduced the 1178 available spaces which were already too few for the 2209 crew and guests onboard.

Male passengers holding a First Class ticket had a one-in-three chance of surviving. Just 57 male upper-deck pass holders survived, compared to 75 Steerage Class men, although this counts for just a 16 per cent survival rate.

By the time lifeboats reached Steerage Class, women and children only boarding was abandoned as a bad call. This left 154 men in the midship to sink.

Children in the upper decks fared far better than those in steerage. While survival rates for children in First and Second classes were almost 100 per cent (29 out of 30), this dropped to just one in three in the Third Class.

Among them was Alfred Rush, who had just celebrated his 17th birthday on April 14, just the day before the Titanic sank.

In the book Titanic - Minute by Minute, Jonathan Mayo recalled how a birthday present led to Rush being refused a place on the lifeboats. Gifted a pair of “long trousers” - a traditional marker of coming of age - his decision to wear his new clothes meant the boy was left behind to drown.

The only people worse off than Steerage Class passengers for survival rate, were the crew.

Of 908 crewmembers aboard the Titanic just 214 survived, 88 per cent of whom were female.

Among those who went down with the ship was chief engineer Joseph Bell (the first to realise the scale of the disaster about to unfold) along with his 24 engineers.