48 29th May 2010
antiquarian books
PREVIEW
Boers’ telling description that helped launch Churchill
“DESCRIPTION escaped prisoner-of- war.... Englishman 25 years old about 5 foot 8 inches tall medium build walks with a slight stoop. Pale features. Reddish brown hair almost invisible small moustache. Speaks through his nose and cannot pronounce the letter S. Had last a brown suit on and cannot speak one word of Dutch.” These were the details circulated by telegram on December 13, 1899, when it was realised that on the previous evening, a young Winston S. Churchill had escaped from the States Model School prison in Pretoria. Having vaulted a wall behind the latrines, Churchill had managed to get onto a train and, with the help of a sympathetic colliery manager, reached safety in neighbouring Portuguese territory.
Far left: the Boer police telegram, estimated at £6000-8000, which was circulated following the escape of Winston Churchill in 1899.
Left: the 1898 Cairo studio portrait, which carries the same estimate.
The fame that this escape brought
Churchill was a key factor in his first electoral success of the following year and in one sense was the turning point in his life. A carbon copy of that Boer police telegram (above), which sold at Sotheby’s in 1986 for £1200, is expected to fetch £6000-8000 when the first portion of a remarkable Churchill collection formed by Malcolm S. Forbes Jnr comes to auction at Christie’s on June 2.
Like his father and grandfather before him, Malcolm Forbes Jnr has
always regarded Churchill as a hero and has spent 30 years assembling an extraordinary range of letters, documents, books and photographs. The financial high spot of the first sale, which is expected to raise something in the region of £1m, should be the group of 32 monthly engagement cards that make up Churchill’s day-to-day appointments diary for the years 1939-45 (estimate £18,000-120,000), but the two lots featured here are both drawn from those that chronicle his early years.
Sold at South Kensington for £2400 in 1990, but now valued at £6000-8000 at King Street, is an 1898 studio portrait of young Winston in tropical kit seen left. Bearing the stamp of a Cairo photographer, J. Heÿman, it dates from the period in which Churchill had secured six months leave in order to take part in the Sudanese campaign under Kitchener.
A simple ‘Winston’ inscription suggests that the photograph was intended for a close family member.
PREVIEW UPDATE
The 1507 edition of The Golden Legend bearing a Wynkyn de Worde colophon featured in ATGNo 1939 sold for £20,000 at Netherhampton Salerooms on May 12.
British & Irish Book Auctions
May 26@
May 26*@ May 26*@ May 27@ May 27@ May 27*@ May 27*@ May 27*@ May 27*@ May 27*@
May 27-28@ May 28*@ May 28*@ May 28*@ May 28*@ May 29*@ May 29@ ends Jun 1 Jun 2 Jun 2
Jun 2*
Jun 2*@ Jun 3*
Jun 3-4*
Coronelli goes to sea…
Books, Maps & MSS, Lyon & Turnbull - Edinburgh (0131 557 8844) Polar Letters & MSS Section, Bamfords - Derby (01332 210000) Sports Memorabilia, Dreweatts - Bristol (0117 973 7201) Important Books & MSS, Bloomsbury Auctions (020 7495 9494) Antiquarian & General Books, H&H Auctions - Carlisle (01228 406320) Historical Documents, Autographs & Ephemera, Mullocks - Ludlow (01694 771771) 9-lot Antiquarian Books Section, Richard Winterton - Lichfield (01543 251081) 5-lot Book Section, Chorleys - Gloucester (01452 344499)
10-lot Book, Map & Ephemera Section, Silverwoods - Clitheroe (01200 423322) 11-lot Book Section, Hansons - Derby (01283 733988) Books, Maps & Ephemera, Keys - Aylsham (01263 733195) 30-lot Book Section, Rendells - Ashburton (01364 653017)
26-lot Book Section: Militaria Sale, Durrants - Beccles (01502 713490) 9-lot Book Section, Bigwoods - Stratford-upon-Avon (017879 269415) 7-lot Book Section, Tring Market Auctions (01442 826446)
Book Card & Ephemera Section,Willingham Auctions (01954 261252) 595-lot Book Section, Taylors - Montrose (01674 672775) Online Comics Sale, Comic Book Auctions (
www.compalcomics.com) MSS & Books,Christie’s (020 7389 2153)
Malcolm Forbes Jr. Colln: Winston S. Churchill (Pt.I), Christie’s (020 7389 2151) Book Section, Maxwells - Wilmslow (0161 439 5182) Book Section, Hansons - Derby (01283733988)
Small Book Section, David Hancock - Moreton-in-Marsh (01608 650428)
BookSection, Adam Partridge - Macclesfield (01260 223675)
Jun 5* Book & Ephemera Section, Classic Vehicles Sale, Peter Francis - Carmarthen (01267 233456)
Sales marked with an * are those in which books and ephemera form part of a larger sale. Sales marked @ are viewable on
the-saleroom.com. Auctioneers are asked to send details of specialist book sales, and those sales that may contain significant book and ephemera sections, to: Ian McKay
Tel: (01795) 890475 • Fax: (01795) 890014 •
ianmckay1@btinternet.com
VINCENZO Maria Coronelli is famous in the history of Italian map and globe making and his work was well represented in the Benevento collection sale at Sotheby’s on May 6 (see ATGNo 1941), but the lot that made the big money was something different. This was not a chart or a globe, but a reminder of the great maritime heritage of the
Venetian Republic, Navi, o vascelli, galee, galeazza, galeori e galeatte, bucintoro... ed altre barche praticate degli Europa, Africani, Asiatici, ed Americani...
The content of copies in institutional collections in Venice and Barcelona is not consistent, but this example, once in the library of Count Nikolai Aleksandrovich Kushelev-Bezborodko, presented a total of 72 engraved plates, one of which is
seen above. Sixty-seven of these plates, of which 25 are double-page and six folding, show ships of various ages and countries. Sotheby’s could find no other record of this rare folio collection of 1697 having come to auction.
In their general travel sale of the same
day, Sotheby’s took a bid of £12,000 on a 1602 first of The Seamans Kalendar... It was an immensely popular addition to the literature on the art of navigation, and though only five first edition copies of John Tapp’s book are recorded, this was at least a familiar one. The ex-Boise Penrose copy, it is the only one to have come up for sale in recent decades and was last seen at auction in 2007, when as part of the Frank Streeter library it made $28,000 (then £14,070) at Christie’s New York.
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