The Historical Auction Series No.2 The H. Bradley Martin Sale 1989-1990
A Lewis & Clark, in orginal boards...
Who was H. Bradley Martin as a collector? For an answer to this question, let’s turn again to Sotheby’s 1988 pre-sale press release:
Commencing his collecting in 1924 at the age of eighteen with the purchase of a first edition of Tom Sawyer at a shop on Fourteenth Street in Manhattan, the New York-born H. Bradley Martin began to pursue his book collecting interests with a refinement of taste and a singleness of purpose which would stay with him over the next 63 years. His undergraduate years at Oxford familiarized him with the book dealers of Oxford and London. Hospitalization for a broken leg in 1929 introduced him to the works of W.H. Hudson, through whom Martin became a student of ornithology. Not even wartime service in the O.S.S. interrupted Martin’s collecting: proof sheets for one sale catalogue were sent to him on duty in North Africa. While stationed in London during World War II, he acquired one of his few illuminated manuscripts, a commentary on the Apostle’s Creed with twelve magnificent full-page miniatures by Jean Poyet, the celebrated Renaissance illustrator. After the war he began to purchase at auction, both in New York and London.
And, from another Sotheby’s publication, an introduction to the first of the Martin sale catalogues:
By the 1930s, Mr. Martin was established as a book collector and for the next 50 years, until his death in 1988, he received – and read – virtually every catalogue produced by booksellers and auction houses alike. Throughout the book world, he was known as a discerning and meticulous collector, one with specific, if broad, interests who was unwilling to compromise his standards…[Subsequent to the war] he became a major buyer at auction, participating in the great sales of the 1940s onward – Sadleir, Wilkinson, Swann, Litchfield, Bute, to mention only a few….He and Mrs. Martin made frequent buying trips to London and Paris, staying in the Ritz or the other and combing bookshops in both cities….”Mr. Martin approached each field in a different way, and there can be few private libraries which illustrate so well the varieties of collecting,” Stephen Weissman has observed. [From the Introduction to Sale 5870/The Martin Library, Part I: Audubon/The Library of H. Bradley Martin/John James Audubon/Magnificent Books and Manuscripts (Tuesday, August 6, 1989)]
There is another, quite significant, point to be made about the way in which H. Bradley Martin went about collecting: Yes, he had the financial ability and the disposition needed to acquire a really great library. But Martin had another crucial quality as well: he had the educational background necessary to make decisions and he had the backbone, both financial and mercurial, to make the majority of his purchases without relying on the assistance of a curator or an advisor. As Katherine Leab, editor of American Book Prices Current, put it in an article in The Washington Post in June 1989, “…He also had all the brains. He did it all himself. But then again, he didn’t have to work for a living, did he?” [“The Imperfect Binding of H. Bradley Martin’s Rare Book Collection” by David Streitfeld, The Washington Post, June 6 1989.]
DOYLE, July 23: STOKES, I. N. PHELPS. The Iconography of Manhattan Island, 1498-1909. New York: Robert H. Dodd, 1915-28. Estimate: $3,000-5,000
DOYLE, July 23: [AUTOGRAPH - US PRESIDENT]FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT. A signed photograph of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Estimate $500-800
DOYLE, July 23: [ARION PRESS]. ABBOTT, EDWIN A. Flatland. A Romance of Many Dimensions. San Francisco, 1980. Estimate $2,000-3,000.
DOYLE, July 23: TOLSTOY, LYOF N. and NATHAN HASKELL DOLE, translator. Anna Karénina ... in eight parts. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., [1886]. Estimate: $400-600
DOYLE, July 23: ROWLING, J.K. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. London: Bloomsbury, 2000. Estimate $1,200-1,800
Freeman’s | Hindman Western Manuscripts and Miniatures July 8, 2025
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FRANCESCO PETRARCH (b. Arezzo, 20 July 1304; d. Arqua Petrarca, 19 July 1374). $20,000-30,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF THE VITAE IMPERATORUM (active Milan, 1431-1459). $15,000-20,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF ATTAVANTE DEGLI ATTAVANTI (GABRIELLO DI VANTE) (active Florence, c. 1452-c. 1520/25). $15,000-20,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FOLLOWER OF HERMAN SCHEERE (active London, c. 1405-1425). $15,000-20,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. An exceptionally rare, illuminated music leaf from a Mozarabic Antiphonal with sister leaves mostly in museum collections. $11,500-14,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Exceptional leaf from a prestigious Antiphonary by a leading illuminator of the late Duecento. $11,500-14,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF MS REID 33 and SELWERD ABBEY SCRIPTORIUM (AGNES MARTINI?) (active The Netherlands, Groningen, c. 1468-1510). $10,000-15,000.
Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Previously unknown illumination from one of the most renowned Gothic Choir Book sets of the Middle Ages. $6,000-8,000.
Forum Auctions Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper 17th July 2025
Forum, July 17: Lucianus Samosatensis. Dialogoi, editio princeps, second issue, Florence, Laurentius Francisci de Alopa, 1496. £10,000 to £15,000.
Forum, July 17: Boccaccio (Giovanni). Il Decamerone, Florence, Philippo di Giunta, 1516. £10,000 to £15,000.
Forum, July 17: Henry VII (King) & Philip the Fair (Duke of Burgundy). [Intercursus Magnus], [Commercial and Political Treaty between Henry VII and Philip Duke of Burgundy], manuscript copy in Latin, original vellum, 1499. £8,000 to £12,000.
Forum, July 17: Bible, English. The Holy Bible, Conteyning the Old Testament, and the New, Robert Barker, 1613. £4,000 to £6,000.
Forum, July 17: Bond (Michael). A Bear Called Paddington, first edition, signed presentation inscription from the author, 1958. £4,000 to £6,000.
Forum Auctions Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper 17th July 2025
Forum, July 17: Yeats (William Butler). The Secret Rose, first edition, with extensive autograph corrections, additions and amendments by the author for a new edition, 1897. £6,000 to £8,000.
Forum, July 17: Byron (George Gordon Noel, Lord). Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, bound in dark green morocco elaborately tooled in gilt and with 3 watercolours to fore-edge, by Fazakerley of Liverpool, 1841. £4,000 to £6,000.
Forum, July 17: Miró (Juan), Wassily Kandinsky, John Buckland-Wright, Stanley William Hayter and others.- Spender (Stephen). Fraternity, one of 101 copies, with signed engravings by 9 artists. £6,000 to £8,000.
Forum, July 17: Sowerby (George Brettingham). Album comprising 22 leaves of original watercolour drawings of fossil remains of Cheltenham and Vicinity, [c.1840]. £6,000 to £8,000.
Forum, July 17: Mathematics.- Blue paper copy.- Euclid. De gli Elementi, Urbino, Appresso Domenico Frisolino, 1575. £12,000 to £18,000.
Sotheby’s Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern Now through July 10, 2025
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Book of Hours by the Masters of Otto van Moerdrecht, Use of Sarum, in Latin, Southern Netherlands (Bruges), c.1450. £20,000 to £30,000.
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Albert Einstein. Autograph letter signed, to Attilio Palatino, on his research into General Relativity, 12 May 1929. £12,000 to £18,000.
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: John Gould. The Birds of Europe, [1832-] 1837, 5 volumes, contemporary half morocco, subscriber’s copy. £40,000 to £60,000.
Sotheby’s Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern Now through July 10, 2025
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Ian Fleming. A collection of James Bond first editions, 8 volumes in all. £8,000 to £12,000.
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, 1997, first edition, hardback issue. £50,000 to £70,000.
Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.R.R. Tolkien. Autograph letter signed, to Amy Ronald, on Pauline Baynes's map of Middle Earth, 1970. £7,000 to £10,000.