Catalogue of the valuable library of the Horticultural Society ... which will be sold at auction, by Messrs. S. Leigh Sotheby & John Wilkinson.
Information
Title
Catalogue of the valuable library of the Horticultural Society ... which will be sold at auction, by Messrs. S. Leigh Sotheby & John Wilkinson.
Record type
Book
Date
1859
Scope & content
Attached by paper clip to the final leaf of the preceding pamphlet is a letter on British Museum letterhead, dated 5 June 1928, signed by J.L. Wood, announcing that the firm bidding on behalf of the Museum at Sotheby's auctions in the 1850s was T. & W. Boone - but this copy does not list the purchasers.
For the history of the Horticultural Society's library, see Elliott, The Royal Horticultural Society (2004), chapter 9. Extract: "On 7 January 1859 Council demanded that ?every head of expenditure be reduced to the lowest possible point consistent with the existence of the Society?, and that included the sale of the Library. Sotheby?s agreed to sell the Library so long as Lindley corrected the sale catalogue. The collection of nearly 1200 drawings was offered for £500, first to the Department of Science and Art, then to the British Museum; these offers failed, and the drawings were included in the auction. In March, the Society?s bankers were at last willing to advance them £500 ? on the surety of the library sale. From that point, even after the financial picture started to improve, there was no reasonable hope that Council would withdraw from the auction. ... The sale duly took place over four days, from 2-5 May 1859: 985 lots fetched a total of £1112.1.6. (Lindley himself bought some books from the sale.)"
Full title: Catalogue of the valuable library of the Horticultural Society, comprising a very complete series of works on botany, horticulture and agriculture, including a superb copy of Sibthorp's Flora Græca; the Flora Danica; Flora Napoletana; Flora Fluminensis, Gallesio's Pomona Italiana; Bateman's Orchidaceæ of Mexico; Lindley's Sertum orchidaceum; the splendid publications of Jacquin, &c. together with several series of magnificent botanical drawings, by Bauer, Lindley, Curtis, Hooker, Mrs. Withers, Mrs. Pope, Miss Cotton, and others, including ten portfolios by native Chinese artists. Which will be sold by auction, by Messrs. S. Leigh Sotheby & John Wilkinson, auctioneers of literary property and works illustrative of the fine arts at their house, 3, Wellington Street, Strand, on Monday, the 2nd day of May, and three following days, at one o'clock precisely. May be viewed two days prior, and catalogues had.