Raynors HCA 2014-11
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 11/6/2014
Complete and authentic issue of the Harper’s Weekly, July 13, 1861, 16pp., disbound. from the interior, a horizontal full page engraving, “A SLAVE AUCTION AT THE SOUTH.-FROM AN ORIGINAL SKETCH BY THEODORE R. DAVIS...” shows a man, women and baby on the auction block. The 7 star Confederate flag hangs in the background. There is a detailed 2/3 column associated report on a later page, “A SLAVE AUCTION AT THE SOUTH”, in part “...Mr. Davis, our special artist, who lately travele through the South ... thus describes slave auctions in a letter from Montgomery, Alabama. ....’N-i-n-e h-hun-nerd and fifty dollars ! Only nine h-hun-nerd and fifty dollars offered for him!’ exclaimed the man, in the tone of injured dignity, remonstrance, and surprise, which can be insinuated by all true auctioneers into the dryest numerical statements. ‘Will no one make any advance on nine hundred and fifty dolloars?’ ... I am neither sentimentalist nor Black Republican, nor negro-worshiper, but I confess the sight caused a strange thrill through my heart. I tried in vain to make myself familiar with the fact that I could, for the sum of $975, become as absolutely the owner of that mass of blood, bones, sinew, flesh, and brains as of the horse which stood by my side. ... The negro was sold to one of the by-standers, and walked off with his bundle God knows where. ‘Niggers is cheap,’ was the only remark of the bystanders. ... Another auctioneer, a fat, flabby, perspiring, puffy man, was trying to sell a negro girl who stood on the deal box beside him. ... She, too, had a little bundle in her hand, and looked out at the buyers front a pair of huge sad eyes. ‘Niggers were cheap;’ still here was this young woman going for an upset price of $610, but no one would bid, and the auctioneer, after vain attempts to raise the price and excite competition, said, ‘Not sold to-day, Sally; you may get down.’ VG. Another of this issue reached $1000 in one of our 2012 auctions.
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