Colonel Archibald Gracie IV, a real estate investor, member of the wealthy Scottish-American Gracie family, embarked at Southampton. The Cavendishes of London were among other prominent British couples on board as well. Lord Pirrie, chairman of Harland and Wolff intended to travel aboard the Titanic, but illness prevented him from joining the ill-fated voyage; however White Star Line's Managing Director J. Bruce Ismay and the ship's Harland and Wolff designer, Thomas Andrews, were both on board to oversee the ship's progress on her maiden voyage.[11]