Cumbria

Drawings by the great fell-walking guidebook author catch the mood of escapism

Adrian Gilmour, co-owner of the Hungerford Arcade, is thrilled at news that non-essential retail can reopen in April.

This silver teapot has London hallmarks for 1792 and a maker’s mark for silversmith Michael Plummer who worked out of Gutter Lane, London, from 1791-95.

The surprise lot at Thomson Roddick (18% buyer’s premium) was one in which the principal attraction may well have been a penny broadside of 1826.

Gold pin awarded to Second World War Polish pilot later executed after the Great Escape

It was not in the best of conditions, but an unusual cartographic lot in an August 6 sale at Thomson Roddick (17.5% buyer’s premium) of Carlisle sold at £420.

A group of three watercolours depicting Indian scenes attributed to Major General John Brownrigg Ballasis (1806-90) attracted interest at a timed sale held this summer by 1818 Auctioneers (20% buyer’s premium) in Milnthorpe, Cumbria.

Featured in Previews, ATG No 2449, was an amusing illustration of the Vacuum Tube, a proposed new means of mass transport from the pages of the Glasgow Looking Glass, a publication that has come to be widely regarded as the world’s first comic.

A record price of £10,200 was paid last month for a pen and ink sketch by fell-walking legend Alfred Wainwright at 1818 Auctioneers of Milnthorpe, Cumbria.

Shortly before the UK lockdown, Cumbrian saleroom Thomson Roddick (17.5% buyer’s premium inc VAT) offered works from the collection of The Shorthorn Society, a body that promotes the famous breed of cattle in the UK and Ireland.

Seven lots by celebrated local artist Percy Kelly (1918-93) put in a decent performance at the most recent Antiques & Fine Art sale held by Cumbrian saleroom Mitchells (22% buyer’s premium).

Books, catalogues, ephemera, pictures and other material from the collections of the Shorthorn Society of the United Kingdom & Ireland formed a significant part of a recent Carlisle sale.

Maud O’Reilly (1886-1971), a key figure in Queensland’s Arts & Crafts movement and a student of the LJ Harvey school, showed her pottery at a number of British exhibitions in the mid 1920s.

An historic archive belonging to the engineer who oversaw the design of the Mulberry Harbours in the Second World War comes to auction in Cumbria later this month.

Battered and dust-engrained when found in a basement during a Lake District house clearance, an early unsigned brass lantern clock generated great excitement at Penrith Farmers’ & Kidd’s (18% buyer’s premium).

Frankly catalogued as in need of restoration and ‘sold as seen’, a late-17th century walnut and marquetry chest had the inherent quality to attract phone and internet bidders from across the UK to the Carlisle rooms of Thomson Roddick (17.5% buyer’s premium).

Comics played a significant part in a recent held by Mitchells (20% buyer’s premium) of Cockermouth, undoubtedly helped by the presence of some 30,000 Marvel comics from one private collection.

Modestly estimated at just £100-150 in a recent Carlisle sale, an 18th century manuscript notebook offering ‘An Account of the Improvements in the Gardens & Park at Cannonhall’ proved a major attraction.