Do you have any old books or letters that might be of interest to Irish historians? If so, they could be worth quite a bit, as a glance at selected items from two forthcoming auctions can illustrate.
Letters from well-known personalities can be highly valued. For instance, a series of 40 letters by Brian O'Nolan (a.k.a. Flann O'Brien and Myles na gCopaleen) which discuss details of his work, complain about publishers who will not pay what they owe him and rogues who want to make money from his work, goes under the hammer at Mealy's annual Dublin rare book sale on December 1st and December 2nd at the Tara Tower Hotel on Merrion Road. They are expected to fetch £5,000-£7,000.
An original 1916 Proclamation of the Irish Republic in the forthcoming sale, described by Mr Fonsie Mealy as "one of only a handful in private hands" and the "most important document in Irish history", is expected to fetch between £27,000 and £32,000. Last December, Mealy's sold a Proclamation which fetched £27,000. An original Proclamation can be identified by the size of paper (30 inches by 20 inches); the quality and colour of the paper; the style of typography, including wrong fonts and spaces; measurements of typeface or the length of lines; differences in spellings, for instance, in the names of the signatories and various other typographical signs.
Other letters in the Mealy's sale include a collection to and from the Lennox sisters and their husbands. Several of these are concerned with - and give eyewitness accounts of - the 1798 insurrection.
One Lennox sister married the Duke of Leinster. Their son was rebel leader Lord Edward Fitzgerald. Another Lennox sister gave birth to Charles James Fox, a radical British politician. The letters are expected to fetch £14,000 to £18,000.
A sale at Bonhams in London, also on December 1st and December 2nd, indicates that Irish books and letters have a market beyond this State.
An autograph book with contributions from 50 Volunteers in Mountjoy Jail dating from the few weeks between the signing of the Anglo-Irish Treaty in London and its ratification by the Dail, and preceding the Civil War, should attract some interest.
Entries include nationalist verses, drolleries and doggerel, some in Irish. The longest is the Litany of the Auxaleries which begins: "From the IRA. From Buck shot. From the Snares of trenches. From the danger of road mines. From Running ambushes. From ditches and High walls. O Lord Deliver us." It is expected to fetch £800 to £1,000 sterling.
Mr David Park, book specialist at Bonhams, says an 1870 first edition book by John Stuart Mill, Chapters and Speeches on the Irish Land Question, belonged to Chichester Fortescue. An Irish speaker, Fortescue was a Liberal MP and Chief Secretary for Ireland from 1865 to 1866.
Fortescue drafted the first Land Act for Ireland and Mill made a special speech about it. Fortescue's copy has "all sorts of underlinings and little notes which is interesting given that it was a very important Act because it stopped landlords kicking people out without paying them for improvements that they had made to the property", says Mr Park. (Estimate £300 to £400.)
"We also have one of the best George Bernard Shaw letters ever. It's all about his views on love, sex, prostitutes and women. And he wrote this to a woman in 1895. It's an astonishingly frank letter," says Mr Park in which Shaw proposes a trade union for prostitutes and states: "I value the physical sensation of sexual intercourse about as highly as I value a piece of plum cake." (Estimate: £2,000 to £3,000.)
Readers can contact Mr Fonsie Mealy of Mealy's, by phoning 056 41229, or Mr David Park of Bonhams by ringing 044171 393 3986.
