Bringing the second highest price in the sale and record auction price was a rare third edition of The Book of Mormon, 1840, which sold for more than six times its high estimate at $20,000.
Auction Action In New York City
NEW YORK CITY – Swann Galleries brought printed and manuscript Americana across the block on April 13 in a sale that totaled $501,218. The sell-through rate was 82 percent with 261 registered bidders.
“Several sections from the Americana sale produced notable highlights, including the Civil War run, which featured three notable soldier diaries, a run of books by theologian Jonathan Edwards and Latin Americana. Five records were set in the sale, and at least 31 of the 254 lots were bought by institutions, including five of the top 12,” said Swann specialist Rick Stattler.
Records include an 1840 third edition of the Book of Mormon, which brought $20,000, despite lacking the title page. Two books by theologian Jonathan Edwards set records: Life of David Brainerd at $1,625 and Great Christian Doctrine of Original Sin at $2,125. Nehemiah Grew’s 1701 Cosmologia Sacra brought $1,125. And, a whaling log by Francis Harrisson brought $18,750, the most ever paid for a single whaling log at Swann.
Bringing more than twice its high estimate, a Sixteenth Century dictionary for the Purépecha or Tarascan language spoken in the highlands of Michoacán realized $36,250, leading the overall sale. The rare imprint was printed by Juan Pablos, the first printer in the New World. Leaves 80 to 87 in the first part contain an analysis of word roots. The annotations include some additional translations from Spanish into the Michoacán tongue.
The sale was led by a Sixteenth Century dictionary for the Purépecha or Tarascan language spoken in the highlands of Michoacán and printed by Juan Pablos, the first printer in the New World, which brought more than twice its high estimate at $36,250.
Second highest price in the sale was posted by the above mentioned third edition of The Book of Mormon, 1840, which sold for more than six times its high estimate. It contained a typo, an upside-down “e” on page 9 and was the first stereotyped edition, the last one that Joseph Smith had the opportunity to personally revise. Only about 4,000 copies were printed, with perhaps 500 issued in this state before the “e” was flipped, making it a smaller print run than the 1830 first edition, and thus scarcer at auction.
There were more Mexican imprints of note. A 1578 first edition of a work by Mexico’s great scholar of the Nahuatl language, Alonso de Molina, was bid to eight times its high estimate, selling for $20,000. It was the seventh and final of his works in Nahuatl written over four decades.
In the category of Nineteenth Century whaling journals, Francis Harrisson’s journal of a third mate on a four-year whaling expedition to the South Pacific left the gallery at twice high estimate, $18,750. Consisting of 348 manuscript pages and covering a period between August 11, 1839, to August 7, 1843, it fulfilled the main attraction of any whaling log, which is to relay the dramatic stories of the hunt. The journal’s keeper, Francis Harrisson (1809-1883) of New Bedford, Mass., was a veteran mariner, having already made several voyages around Cape Horn. In 1839 he shipped out as third mate on the Corinthian. The ship stopped, among other places, the Azores; Juan Fernandez Islands off Chile; Paita and Callao, Peru; Talcahuano, Chile; and Pernambuco, Brazil. They also stopped briefly in the Galapagos Islands, five years after Darwin’s visit. Like many of the best whaling journals, this one is richly illustrated with inked stamps to denote every whale hunted, and every ship encountered – more than 300 stamps in total.
An oil painting, 26 by 40 inches, depicting “The 16th Maine Volunteers, First Day at the Battle of Gettysburg,” earned $8,750. It was signed “C.F.L,” possibly for Cherbury F. Lothrop, a farmer from Chesterville, Maine. Shown is the 16th Maine Volunteers shortly before they were overwhelmed by Confederate forces on the first morning of the Battle of Gettysburg, July 1, 1863.
From Alaska, circa 1906, came a later compilation of a whale hunt, this one Suzanne Rognon Bernardi’s “The Story of a Whale Hunt,” an album of 28 photographs, mounted with extensive manuscript text. It gaveled for $8,125 and described the whale hunting season as told by Bernardi (1870-1953), who came to Alaska in 1901 to work as a teacher and missionary and remained there through 1912. She compiled several of these albums, all of them titled “Story of a Whale Hunt,” but each with different text and different arrangements of photographs. Some of the photographs were taken by her brother Jack Rognon.
Westward expansion was represented by a pamphlet, The Oregonian; or, History of the Oregon Territory: Containing the Laws of Oregon. “No. I,” by Charles Saxton, who traveled by wagon train to Oregon in 1844, and returned east to Washington the following year. Realizing $16,250 against a $4/6,000 estimate, the 48-page pamphlet described the political situation in Oregon, and compiled several key documents, including an 1840 petition by Oregonians for the protection of the United States, and the minutes of the meetings conducted at Champoig to establish the first Oregonian government. Both the United States and Great Britain disputed the ownership of the Oregon country.
Printed documents relating to the American Civil War were amply represented in this sale, the foremost being the foundational Confederate imprint, the Charleston Mercury Extra…”The Union is Dissolved!,” a letterpress broadside from December 20, 1860. The first printing of the first act of secession, printed just 15 minutes after the final vote, essentially announcing the birth of the Confederacy and beginning of the Civil War, the broadside went out at $15,000. The printers were well aware of the significance of the news, emphasizing “The Union Is Dissolved” in large block letters.
The diary of a Virginia Military Institute cadet pressed into active service during the Civil War fetched $9,375. The cadet in question William T. Dillard of Amherst County, Va., who was a cadet at the Virginia Military Institute toward the end of the war. The cadets, aged 15 and up, were called up for emergency service at the Battle of New Market – the only time in American history a school’s student body was pressed into combat as a distinct unit. Dillard served as a private in the provisional regiment and was one of the many wounded. The campus was burned by Union troops in June 1864. This diary dates from a few months later, when the institute was on more or less active duty, moving from camp to camp while seeking a new temporary home in Richmond.
From Alaska, circa 1906, Suzanne Rognon Bernardi’s “The Story of a Whale Hunt,” an album of 28 photographs, mounted with extensive manuscript text, gaveled for $8,125.
Selling for $10,625 were two diary journals of a desert expedition undertaken by the 1st California Cavalry in California and Arizona from December 3, 1863, to January 16, 1864. The two diary journals, one by Captain Samuel A. Gorham (b circa 1835) and the other by an unknown author, provide parallel descriptions of a rugged journey by Company G of the 1st California Cavalry, from Drum Barracks in Los Angeles to Fort Yuma in California’s southeast corner, and then on to Tucson, Ariz. Gorham was a Sacramento saddler before the war. The other journal, with moderate wear and one leaf detached, describes the company as “We” but does not indicate a specific author.
The sale offered the letters and diaries of W.H. Dorris, a private in the 83rd Illinois during the Civil War. There were three diaries with a total of 293 manuscript diary pages plus memoranda, 97 letters and one notebook, with dates ranging from 1858 to 1898, the bulk of which spanned 1863-1865. William Henderson Dorris (1828-1892) was born in Tennessee and came to Illinois with his parents in his youth. He served in the 3rd Illinois Volunteers in the Mexican War. In his late thirties, as a resident of rural Swan Creek, Warren County, Ill., he served three years as a private in Company K of the 83rd Illinois Infantry. The most famous member of Company K was Virgil Earp, who went on to fame at the OK Corral, although Swann specialists see no references to him in these papers, which sold for $8,750.
Not all of the Civil War material was narrative in form. There was art, too, specifically, an oil painting, 26 by 40 inches, depicting “The 16th Maine Volunteers, First Day at the Battle of Gettysburg.” Bid to $8,750, the painting signed “C.F.L,” possibly for Cherbury F. Lothrop (1838-1936), a farmer from Chesterville, Maine, who enlisted as a sergeant and mustered out as a first lieutenant, the view shows the 16th Maine shortly before they were overwhelmed. On the first morning of the Battle of Gettysburg, July 1, 1863, the Union Army’s 1st Corps was buckling under the Confederate onslaught northwest of the town center. As they fell back to Cemetery Ridge, the 16th Maine Infantry was given an impossible task: hold their position at any cost, to slow down the Confederate advance and guard the Union retreat. They were soon surrounded and overwhelmed. Shortly before they were captured, the color guard tore up the blue and gold regimental flag, distributing pieces among the troops so the Confederates could not enjoy it as a trophy.
The foundational Confederate imprint, the Charleston Mercury Extra…”The Union is Dissolved!,” a letterpress broadside from December 20, 1860, constituted the first printing of the first act of secession and went out at $15,000.
Earlier printed Americana in the sale included a group of letters to John Augustine Washington III, the great-grandnephew of George Washington and the last private owner of Mount Vernon. He leased it from his mother from 1841 onward, and inherited it outright in 1855. At the outbreak of the Civil War, Washington joined the Confederate Army as aide-de-camp to his relative by marriage, Robert E. Lee, and in September 1861, he was shot dead by a Union sniper. The letters went out at $11,250.
A previously unknown first printing in the Americas of a scarce and important report on the Abipóne, Charrua, Guaycuru and Mocobi peoples of Paraguay was bound as issued with an extract on Paraguay from Santacilia and Ulloa’s 1748 “Relacion historica” of their scientific voyage to South America. It made $9,375.
A group of 12 American printings of works by Jonathan Edwards, 1746-1793, eight volumes in unmatched contemporary calf realized $7,500, more than eight times high estimate; and a lot of Judaica, Liber Psalmorum Hebraïce, Francis Hare, editor, comprising the first printing of any part of the Bible in Hebrew in America with translation and notes in Latin, brought $7,250.
Prices given include the buyer’s premium as stated by the auction house. For information, www.swanngalleries.com or 212-254-4710.
