unique books - Callum James Books

UNIQUE BOOKS
and other items (2)
CALLUM JAMES BOOKS
July 2015
Welcome...
SALES
...to this catalogue of unique books and other items. I’m aware
that the title needs a little explanation. The catalogue contains
books which have been written by hand or ‘assembled’ in some
way, manuscripts, journals, scrapbooks, students’ notes, diaries,
albums and so on, sometimes such books have accretions, items
stuck in or laid in, anything which is, by its very nature unique
in the world.
I issued a short catalogue of unique items eighteen months ago
and was pleasantly surprised by the response. I think this kind
of material has a special place in the heart of the collector and
book lover . But I realise, of course, that the subject matter is
extremely varied and that matching the right person to the right
item will take a lot more work than with a catalogue based, for
example around a particular theme or author. For this reason,
this catalogue is much more of a starting point than some of my
previous lists and I would be particularly grateful if you think
you know of someone with an interest that matches one of the
items here if you would point it out to them if they are unlikely
to be on our list.
To purchase an item from this catalogue
please send an email to the address above
and we will confirm availability and shipping
costs. Please be sure to let us know where in
the world you are.
Payments can be made via Paypal and we
will send invoices through Paypal for your
records and convenience. You do not have
to have a Paypal account to use the website
to securely pay for items with a credit or
debit card.
We also still like an old-fashioned cheque
so long as it is in Sterling and drawn on
a UK bank. We can provide payee details
of course, also bank details for anyone
prefering to pay by electronic transfer.
Callum James
July, 2015.
Callum James Books
31A Chichester Road
Portsmouth
UK - PO2 0AA
+44 (0)2392 696150
[email protected]
Front Free Endpaper Blog:
callumjames.blogspot.com
Website: www.callumjamesbooks.com
Twitter: @CallumJBooks
Cover illustration from item 6.
© Callum James Books, 2015
1. Two Volumes of Clippings. [1840s-50s]
A wonderful collection of clippings pasted
two columns to a page covering all manner of
subjects. There are a few consecutive pages
which follow the grisly details of a bookbinder
who murdered one of his clients. There are lots
of references to Napoleon and current affairs.
The compiler seemed very interested in probate
and includes a number of clippings about the
will or this or that important person, often with
details of their collections or libraries, the will
of William Beckford is mentioned in some of
this reportage. The compiler also memorialises
two significant moments in the weather, a snow
storm and on a separate occasion, an electrical
storm which broke the glass domes of such
buildings as Buckingham Palace with its hail.
There are clippings here describing the great sale
of the contents of Horace Walpole’s Strawberry
Hill gothic mansion. The pages are sewn into
card covers with coloured paper spines. There
is some scuffing to the spines and soiling to the
card. 132 pages and 76 pages.
25cm x 16.5cm.
£50
2. Selections from Handel [c.1875]
A true labour of love; the illustrated,
hand-drawn title page tells us these
Handel pieces were arranged by
Emma J. Graham-Clark and copied
by John A Graham-Clark. There
are then 350 pages of meticulously
hand-written music on printed
staves with an additional 26 pages
at the front of the book cut at the
edge to create an alphabetical
thumb index to the works included.
This must have been the product
of hundreds of hours of work. The
whole has been bound beautifully
in black leather with marbled
endpapers and gilt page edges. The
title and the originators’ initials
are stamped in gilt on the upper
board. Although there is no single
date in the book there are, very
occasionally, initials and dates at
the end of a piece and those dates
are from both the 1870s and 1880s.
£160
3. Violet Dene. Part 1st. [c.1890]
A handwritten manuscript for the first nine
chapters of a book titled ‘Violet Dene’.
Without provenance or signature and so it
must remain something of an oddity. Rather
scruffy looking blue paper wraps. Written
on both sides of the page in a legible hand.
148 pages.
£20
4. ‘Shorthouse’s “John Inglesant”’ A Manuscript
for a Talk by G. W. Lloyd. 26th July, 1896
John Inglesant by Joseph Henry Shorthouse was published in 1881 and became an unlikely success.
It still has a cult following today, despite its somewhat tendentious style and tendency towards
theological exposition. This handwritten booklet has 26 numbered pages (recto only) which, from the
insertion of comments such as “[read p.24]” is suggestive of being the text of a talk and is a summary
of the life and character of John Inglesant. An interesting early reaction to the novel.
20cm x 16cm.
£25
5. Cooking Lectures by Miss Turnbull. October 1901
These are the notes of a student studying to be a a
cookery teacher. The notes cover the lectures on such
things as ‘Why we cook our food’, ‘Gas Stoves’,
‘Invalid Cookery’ , ‘List of Utensils for a class of 18
girls’, ‘Roasting’, ‘Frying’ as well as notes on how
to take a register and what kind of salary to expect.
The book is handwritten in a legible hand sometimes
on the recto only and is about half full with over 50
pages of written text. The feint-ruled notebook is
frayed and bumped at the top and bottom of the spine
and a little rubbed elsewhere but is still solidly bound
with a clean, bright interior.
20cm x 16.5cm x 1.5cm.
£25
6. Englethwaite Auxiliary Military Hospital.
Photograph Album [c. 1916]
Englethwaite Hall was built in 1879 by John
Thomlinson, a plaster of paris ‘magnate’.
The house passed through several owners
before it was taken over by the Red Cross
and opened on July 15th, 1916 as a fully
equipped Auxiliary Hospital with 50 beds.
It remained open, under the charge of Miss
Ida C Kentish, until April 30th, 1919 having
treated 593 patients.
The first 16 leaves of the album feature one
professionally taken photograph on the recto
of each. These measure 15cm x 11.5cm and
all have printed captions underneath. They
show nurses and patients in various parts
of the hospital, including the Mess Room,
a Ward, a bath room, the nurses lounge, the
billiard room and so on. There follow 8 more
leaves with a total of 35 extra photographs,
more candid in style and pasted onto both
sides of each leaf showing soldiers in their
hospital uniforms in groups and singly
undertaking a number of different activities.
For more scans of the professional photos
please visit Front Free Endpaper (07.07.15).
The covers are somewhat bumped and nicked
at the corners, the leaves of the album are
stiff card and have a little curl to them but the
whole is in very good condition. The house
was condemned and pulled down in 1969
and on its site is a caravan park. A unique
historical record.
20cm x 15cm
£200
7. Manuscript Poems. 1916
18 poems written by hand over 70 pages of
a Night Order Book. The poems fill about
half of the feint ruled book. The poems are
about life on board a WW1 torpedo boat in
the first flotilla, mainly it seems, hunting
German U-Boats. One poem indeed is
titled “The Hunting of U12”. The poems
are reasonably light-hearted throughout and
some are clearly intended to be sung. No
Wilfred Owen to be discovered here but an
anonymous and still interesting voice from
the lower ranks.
SOLD
8. Aviation Album. [n.d.]
An leatherbound photo album containing
133 images of First World War aircraft,
predominantly bi-planes. A few of the
images are offset printed presumably
clippings from magazines or books the vast
majority are real photographic postcards and
other photographs. Many of the photographs
have typewritten captions underneath
clearly created by a very knowledgeable
collector. Among many highlights there is
a great photo of pilot and co-pilot checking
reconnaissance cameras on the side of the
plane before takeoff: “‘The Big Ack’ – The
Armstrong Whitworth FK 8 Corps-Recco
Biplane”. Other exemplary captions include
such as, “B. A. T. Basilisk Experimental
Fighting Scout of 1915 – one of the fastest
aeroplanes of the Great War period”, “A
late 1918 Spad, the Type 17C1, being used
as a photographic machine in this picture”
and “The early version of the Nieuport twoseater with observer firing through hole
in top wing”. Most of the images are of
British planes but there are a small number
of German planes represented towards the
back of the album. One leaf of the album has
been excised. There are three or four places
where a photo has clearly been removed.
26cm x 22cm x 5cm.
£600
9. Lehnert and Landrock. A collection of
postcards. [c.1920]
Flourishing from the 1910s to the 1930s,
Rudolf Lehnert was the photographer of
the partnership and Ernst Landrock the
businessman. They operated across North
Africa, barely interrupted by WW1, after
which they set up permanently in Egypt
where there is still a shop today. This large
collection housed in three quarto modern
photo albums, all cards attached to the pages
using photo-corners. The cards are divided
into three categories in the albums: black
and white real-photo postcards, (128 cards),
colour postcards (82 cards), and sepia
toned cards (79 cards). There are also 35
miscellaneous cards including two ‘sets’ in
their original paper wraps, two photogravure
images (each 29cm x 22cm), and handful of
miscellaneous photographs. This totals 324
postcards. The collection is well presented
and although there are duplicates they are
presented together to show differences in
captioning or numbering. The collection
includes numerous examples of Lehnert &
Landrock’s ‘orientalist’ portraits of seminaked youths and young women as well as
topographical material from Tunis, Algeria,
and Egypt. A nice section in the black and
white album includes a set of photos of the
interior of Shepheards Hotel in Cairo.
£500
10. Twelve Silhouettes. [c.1930s]
12 very intricate and finely executed silhouettes of people doing sports and other activities. Each is
drawn in ink on what looks to be sketchbook paper. Clearly they were intended to be a set but they are
unsigned and their purpose is unclear. Two have horizontal creases about an inch from the top edge
which do not touch the images. Very occasional and light spots on the paper. Please visit Front Free
Endpaper (03.03.15) for scans of all the cards.
18cm x 8.5cm.
£20
11. Twelve Fantastical Creatures. [c.1930s]
Presumably by the same artists as the previous item. 12 humorous images in black ink and coloured
pencil in which two animals are joined together to make a peculiar hybrid. Again, the purpose is
unclear. There is a little light spotting to some of the cards. For full scans please see Front Free
Endpaper (25.05.15).
18cm x 8.5cm.
£20
12. Records of Personal Observations of Ways
of Nature by Brenda May Heale. A Schoolgirl.
1935
2 volumes. This is the nature diary of a 13 year old schoolgirl who writes legibly on both sides of
feint ruled pages and illustrates throughout with her own, remarkably accomplished watercolours
and pencil drawings as well as with clippings from magazines and other items like cigarette cards.
Volume one has 21 watercolours and volume two has just six. The entries are made on a regular basis
from May through to the following January and proudly pasted into the front of the first volume is the
certificate received for the “Stanley Special Prize in Science” from the Borough of Croydon Education
Committee. Brenda’s observations fill the whole of the first book and about half of the second.
20cm x 16cm.
£40
13. The School Reports of P. Dicken. 1934-1937
A fun collection of eight school reports, two alumni association membership cards and a copy of the
school magazine The Centaur, from the Derby Central School for Boys. The alumni cards are dated
in the 1960s. The magazine, for Winter 1937, contains a short paragraph by Master Dicken, which is
presumably why it was retained: “Joy? – Or No Joy? The bell announcing the end of the last lesson
rings and we spring up eagerly, each pondering and busily asking his neighbour that fateful question.
It is on every trembling lip, that awful yet historical query. Nervously we all pull off sweaters, jerseys,
waistcoats and other excess clothing, just in case! It may be! … it may not be! Suddenly a loud, bold
rap is heard on our class-room door. Like one man the whole class stiffen, trembling, hoping against
hope. The door swings open, every wavering pale eye is trained on that door. Then to our great horror
a stentorian voice peals out its note of misery and tortuous pain – “No P.T. to-day!””
Also noteworthy in the magazine is a small piece of fiction which begins, “My favourite murder, huh!
Well I guess that takes a bit of thinking out. Of course, the papers reckoned that I excelled myself that
time in Chicago, when I got both the Spumoni brothers, a traffic cop and a stray cat with one bullet…”
One of the reports is missing its top third.
£20
14. Stammbuch der Sippe Franzen. [c.1937]
A manuscript genealogy, decorated and illustrated by hand and unfinished. The manuscript is contained
in unstitched folded sections obviously intended to be bound when complete. There are 260 pages,
54 of which are blank. There are also some pages with decorative borders already in place but no
illustration within. The text in is German throughout and there are numerous illustrations including
two family trees and two pages of maps. It is a meticulous and careful piece of work. The latest date
I can find the text is 1936. The sheets are contained with a somewhat scruffy wrap-around card folder
but are, themselves, in very good order. A curious item which suggests more research.
30cm x 21cm x 2cm.
£65
15. Collection of Postcards of Oriental Rugs
by Hugh S Tovey. [c.1940s]
A collection of 30 postcards each depicting
a different variety of oriental rug all tucked
into a homemade packet with a handwritten
contents on the front and then tucked into a
card folder in manila.
16cm x 11.5cm x 1cm.
£15
16. The Divine Comedy. Yates Thomson MS36.
Photographs by Otto Fein. [c.1940s]
The British Library holds a 15th century, profusely
illustrated manuscript of Dante’s Divine Comedy
known as Yates Thompson MS36. The miniature
paintings that illustrate the manuscript are by two
well-known artists of the day Priamo della Quercia
and Giovanni di Paolo. This album contains 122
black and white photographs by Otto Fein, the
photographer for the Warburg Institute in the
University of London, detailing most likely all the
illustrations in the manuscript. The vast majority
are mounted two to a page and measure 175mm
x 100mm, there are a few larger prints. They are
contained in a leather album which has lost its
backstrip and which is very chipped and rubbed
around the edges. A small copyright stamp on
the last page confirms the photographer and the
Warburg Institute provenance and there is a small
gift inscription at the front of the album.
32cm x 26cm x 3cm.
£100
17. “Shades of Departing Glory. An Account
of the Fashions of 1888 from January to
December”. 1958
A stunning piece of work in a folio
sketchbook with thick watercolour paper
pages. The hand drawn title page is followed
by a six page essay on the subject in a fine
italic script, then there are twelve full-page
annotated watercolours, highlighted in
places with gold and silver paint, depicting
women’s fashion at various points in the
year 1888. A label on the front tells us this
was ‘Evidence of Study’ for the National
Diploma of Design. Black cloth boards.
38cm x 28.5cm x 1cm.
£60
18. Animal Crackers by Will Spencer. [c.1960]
Will Spencer began publishing his cartoons
in newspaper in the 1950s and the Animal
Crackers series of Pocket Cartoons (that is,
one image and one caption cartoons) ran
for nearly 20 years in The London News
Chronicle and later in The Daily Mail. This
is a small album in which someone has
meticulously cut out and pasted 328 of these
cartoons, two per page. An astonishing
amount of work and presumably completed
over a very long period.
13cm x 10cm x3.5cm
£22.
19. Shipping Record by Harold Rose. 1964
This charming little book is a ring bound notebook
in which the young master Rose has recorded his
interest in ships and shipping. The book is full and
has many pages of sillouette drawings of different
kinds of ships along with newspaper clippings
about shipping and, in particular, wrecks, in and
around the Isle of Wight. Harold gives his address
at the front of the book as Cowes on the Island,
home to the internationally famous annual regatta
Cowes Week. Harold has also taped in the weekly
‘shipping movements’ column from his local paper
which gave details of all the major ships expected
to leave or enter the big Solent ports that week.
There are also numerous pages of handwritten notes
from books about all kinds of shipping. In a rather
nice nod to the sometimes inclement conditions
faced by a juvenile ship-watcher, the notebook is
wrapped in clear plastic to keep the worst of the
water off. 88 pages. £20
20. Loch Eil Centre by I. C. Wraith. 8th -24th
August, 1966
A young man’s journal of his two weeks
of adventure at the Loch Eil Centre in
Scotland. Includes an account of his trip to
the summit of Ben Nevis and the camping,
swimming, climbing and larking about
that went on with his fellows. Reads rather
like a boy’s adventure story. Handwritten
on ruled notepaper which has been bound
into stiff card boards with homemade paste
paper covers and a cloth spine. Most of the
book is written on the recto only. The rear
of the book contains some notes from his
tuition. 60 pages.
25cm x 20cm.
£20
21. Calligraphy. Anthology. [n.d.]
A beautiful handmade book with 8 pages of laid paper sewn
with cord into thin card covers. The recto of each page, in a
large calligraphic hand, reproduces a couple of lines from a
poem. Five watercolour illustrations and one illuminated initial
decorate the words. The texts are taken from “Chillingham”
by Mary Elizabeth Coleridge, “Full Fathom Five” and “Ariel’s
Song” from The Tempest and “The Brook” by Tennyson.
29cm x 20cm.
£28