Long ago -- in 1987 to be exact -- I sent a query to _The Book
Collector_ about Thomas Osborne's auction catalogues. It garnered few
responses, and none which solved my problem. I post it now to the
members of these learned lists, in the hope of better luck. I have of
course trawled all the usual sources (Munby and Coral, etc. etc.). If
no one can give me a lead, I think I will just fall silent on the
auction catalogue issue for good. Best to all, and thanks for any
information, Germaine. (see below)
In connection with my edition of the catalogue of the Sidney family
library at Penshurst Place (ca. 1665) I am attempting to track down the
auction catalogue prepared when the books were dispersed. The sale was
conducted under the aegis of Thomas Osborne, or by William Shropshire
(not likely his son Walter, who worked later), acting as Osborne's
agent. According to the _Daily Advertiser_, the auction of the "Library
of the late John, Earl of Leicester , John Nicholls, late Counsellor at
Law and the Rev. Mr. Smith" took place in thirty-one sessions between 10
January and 14 February 1742/3. In 1865, "ABHBA" inquired in _Notes and
Queries_ (3rd series viii, 324) about Osborne's catalogues. His
anonymous respondent listed the many notable libraries Osborne had sold
(though he did not mention the books of the Sidneys), and then observed,
"In 1851 Thomas Thorpe, the bookseller, possessed the most complete
collection of Osborne's catalogues, bound in forty-three volumes 8vo,
1729 to 1768, which he priced at 61.16s.6d. Only five odd volumes of
the series are to be found in our national library, namely, 1736, 1753,
1754 (2 vols.), and 1761." I am attempting to trace the remaining
volumes, in the hope that one of them will provide me with further
information about the dispersal of "Lord Leicester's Library." Does
anyone know where the remaining thirty-eight volumes of Thorpe's
collection might be, or of any references to them in the nearly a
century and a half since the exchange in _Notes and Queries_?
--
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Germaine Warkentin // English (Emeritus)
Victoria College, University of Toronto
73 Queen's Park Crescent, Toronto, Ont. M5S 1K7, CANADA
Fax: (416) 585-4584
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