Bloomsbury Auctions

2010-05-19

Crowe Hall

Crowe Hall is an elegant Regency mansion set in a beautifully landscaped garden just outside the centre Bath and until recently was the home of John Barratt, an eccentric schoolmaster and historian. To walk into the magnificently gloomy library at Crowe was to enter an Edwardian time-capsule, in which a fabulous treasury of rare books had been miraculously preserved from the ravages of time.

The collection was built up by three generations of the family and reflects their remarkably eclectic tastes and interests. Barratt's grandfather, a doctor in Bristol, collected antiquarian books about Bath, Bristol and the West Country as well as many first editions of 19th and early 20th century novels. This strand of the collection was augmented by Barratt's father, the eminent scientist and industrialist Sir Sydney Barratt. Sir Sydney was also passionately interested in art, architecture, furniture, gardening and natural history, and acquired many classic and rare editions of works in these areas. John Barratt continued to add to the collection after his father's death in 1975, with a particular interest in history and travel.

The family was very keen that their prized library of over 3,000 books should be sold by specialist book auctioneers, hence Bloomsbury Auctions, which sells more books and works on paper than any other auction house in the world, was called in. The first part of Books from the Library at Crowe Hall, Bath will be sold at Bloomsbury Auctions in Mayfair on Thursday 27th May and a further group, including a wide selection covering Bath and Bristol will be offered in the Bibliophile sale on Thursday 17th June.

No English gentleman’s library would be complete without a substantial section on architecture and garden design, and the library at Crowe Hall is no exception. The cornerstone of a country house library must be the charming works of Humphry Repton. His first book, Sketches and Hints on Landscape Gardening of 1794 was compiled from his ‘Red Books’ which were specially drawn up for prospective clients, with movable hand-coloured overlays or flaps indicating ‘before’ and ‘after’ his design (estimated £5000-7000). Two other Reptons in the sale are the first edition of Observations on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening of 1803 which is expected to fetch £4000-6000 and Fragments on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening (1816), which has a presale estimate of £6000-8000. Two first editions of John Buonarotti Papworth’s Rural Residencies (1818) and Hints on Ornamental Gardening (1823) which has fine aquatint plates encompassing an aviary, a dairy, an ice house, a Venetian tent and an apiary are estimated to sell for £500-800 each. The collection also has a substantial number of books on design, such as the superb rare Ornaments and Interior Decoration in the Old French Style by Thomas Chippendale which is estimated £750-1000 or Henry Lawford’s unusual Album of Designs for Sofas with 17 hand-coloured lithographs; there is even the rare Pattern Book of Leeds Pottery which was founded in 1770 taking the name Hartley, Greens & Co and which rapidly became a serious rival to Wedgewood and this carries an estimate of £800-1200.

Literature and history also feature in the Barratt library. First editions of the 2 volume Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling are estimated £500-700 and also dating from a similar period, are the nine lots of first edition works by Oscar Wilde ranging from £150-1000 such as The Importance of Being Ernest; A Trivial Comedy for Serious People or The Ballad of Reading Goal.

Travel books in the collection span Britain and the Continent such as the handsome leather bound first edition of William Daniell’s A Voyage Round Great Britain; regarded as the most important colour plate book on British topography, it is expected to fetch £7000-9000. Amongst the local topographical works is the 1806 scarce copy of Bath, Illustrated by a Series of Views by Jean Claude Nattes (estimated £3000-4000). Travelling further afield is a rare Viaggio Pittorico e Storico ai Tre Laghi Maggiore, di Lugano e Como of 1818 which has 46 delicately hand coloured aquatint plates and an estimate of £6000-8000. One of the highlights of the whole sale and the focal point of any important collection of books on Polar Exploration, must be the 3 volume South Polar Times of 1907-1914 by Ernest Shackleton and others, expected to reach £15000-20000. Numbered 100 of 350, these are the best copies that Bloomsbury Auctions has seen and they are made especially desirable by their extremely rare dust-jackets, a vital factor which immediately doubles their value.

Justin Phillips, the specialist in charge of the sale, said ‘It was a pleasure to handle the library of an educated gentleman with such wide-ranging interests, from landscape gardening to Polar exploration, but who still found an important place for works on his home city of Bath and the county of Avon.’

2010-05-10

Travel and Topography

Bloomsbury’s latest two day Travel and Topography sale (6-7 May) was very successful and healthy prices were achieved across the board. The first part of the Walpole collection aroused considerable interest and this consisted of books on Leicestershire and Rutland. Local press snapped up the story as Mike Walpole had been a well known accountant in the area and many items fetched double their estimates. Amongst the maps, lot 45 was a map of Leicestershire from an Actual Survey, Begun in the year 1775 by Rev John Prior and this went for a resounding £1,708 (estimate £300-400). On 27th May Bloomsbury will be selling his celebrated botanical library which is expected to realise £300,000-£400,000.

The sale also boasted some interesting photograph albums such as lot 176, an album of 62 prints predominantly of Chinese subjects dating from 1860-1880 by William Saunders which eventually made £13,420 over four times the high estimate; the following lot was also an album of China by the same photographer and this fetched £8540 (estimate £1500-2000). Maps too proved popular; an 1850 map of the United States of America sold for £2928 against an estimate of £600-800.