A collection of images associated with South Carolina physician and plantation owner Sidney Smith. South Carolina, 1845-50

A unique survival. This important collection of largely identified photographs documents the home and family of Dr. Sidney Smith and those he enslaved at Gravel Hill, his South Carolina plantation. The collection includes an extraordinary daguerreotype depicting Dr. Smith, his two daughters, and his brother, posed together with two enslaved African American men. This is one of the earliest known images—if not the very earliest photograph—of an identified plantation owner posing with enslaved African Americans.

$60,000

The Haggadah. London: Beaconsfield Press, [1940]

FIRST EDITION of the greatest Haggadah of the 20th century, finely printed in color on vellum, published in an edition of 250 copies.  The entire edition of the celebrated Szyk Haggadah was printed on vellum.

This is Szyk’s own copy, out of series and unsigned. An accompanying provenance note states that it descended from Szyk to his heirs until it appeared for sale at Christie’s in New York in 2015.

$55,000

Profile bust portrait of Charles Darwin, signed by Cameron. London: Colnaghi, 1868

The great Darwin portrait, Julia Margaret Cameron’s 1868 profile of Darwin is probably the most famous photograph of a 19th-century scientist. Darwin remarked, “I like this photograph very much better than any other which has been taken of me.”

$52,000

Philosophia Naturalis Principia Mathematica. Cambridge, 1730

SECOND EDITION. . Newton’s Principia is “generally described as the greatest work in the history of science.  Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler had certainly shown the way; but where they described the phenomena they observed, Newton explained the underlying universal laws.  The Principia provided the great synthesis of the cosmos, proving finally its physical unity” (PMM).

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Moby-Dick; or, the Whale. New York: Harper, 1851

FIRST AMERICAN EDITION. From Jonah to Jaws, the Great Fish stories have fascinated readers for thousands of years. Melville’s masterpiece is perhaps the foremost of these tales.

$42,000

Autograph letter signed to his sister [together with] “To the Sun-Set Breeze” Original printer’s proof, signed by Whitman.. Camden, 1890; 29 June 1891

In this fine, warm letter to his sister, Whitman writes, “Love to you sister dear. The day has got along & I have just time to hurry this off to catch this evng’s mail. Much the same with me— hot wave here again. Am anchor’d here at my window as usual. 2 enc’d.” The latter comment may refer to Whitman’s enclosure of the accompanying broadside (see next item). Several well-known photographs capture Whitman in his final years seated at his window at a table overflowing with his papers.

$40,000

Abraham Lincoln delivering his Second Inaugural Address. Washington, March 4, 1865

Lincoln delivers his Second Inaugural Address, one of the most historic photographs of the 19^th century. This famous image shows Lincoln in the act of delivering the address on the east portico of the United States Capitol on March 4, 1865.

$38,000

The Complete Writings. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1902

First edition of “the first comprehensive collection of Whitman’s work.” This is the rare deluxe issue printed on Japan vellum, number 2 of only 10 such sets, in the magnificent original morocco binding.

$38,000

Flowers from My Garden. Sketched and Painted from Nature. [New York], [1864]

FIRST EDITION, a unique pre-publication copy with 18 fine watercolors, the original art used as the basis for the lithographs in the published edition.

$37,500

Shizhuzhai shuhuapu (Ten Bamboo Studio Collection of Calligraphy and Painting). No place, printed ca. 1775

FIRST EDITION, second superstate, of the Ten Bamboo Studio, “perhaps the most beautiful set of prints ever made” (Ebrey).

$35,000