A “VERY RARE” half sheet of the original 1916 Proclamation failed to make its reserve at the London auction house Sotheby’s yesterday.
Sotheby’s gave a guide price of between £20,000 and £30,000 (€23,322 – €34,983) for Lot 13, but it did not disclose the reserve.
The Proclamation was printed in two halves and the document for auction was one of the rarer half sheets containing the second section of the Proclamation.
The text runs from “The Irish Republic” to “Joseph Plunkett”, the last of the signatories. The second half of the Proclamation was said to be in the printing press when the British soldiers arrived at Liberty Hall on April 27th, 1916.
Sotheby’s said this was a very rare document and it was aware of only five other copies in existence. All but one of those were held in institutions, it said.
Lot 13 also contained another document from the Rising. The “Irish Volunteers, Dublin Brigade, Company Mobilisation Order” is printed in black and red, and asks for “arms and full supply of ammunition to be carried”.
The documents were among 153 lots on offer in Sotheby’s auction of English literature, history, children’s books and illustrations.
There were several other items of Irish interest. A first edition of Ulysses in the original wrappers also went unsold. Sotheby’s gave it a guide price of £25,000-£35,000 (€29,150-€40,800). A first edition of JP Donleavy’s The Ginger Man sold for £2,750. The presentation copy was signed by the author on the half-title. A first edition of The Tree Clock by Séamus Heaney, containing an autograph poem, The Point, printed on handmade paper, sold for £2,500.
