Important CDV Album Containing Photographs of Spiritualists, Social Reformers, Suffragettes, and Abolitionists, Incl. Sojourn

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American History, Featuring the Property of N...

By Cowan's Auctions

Jun 9, 2017 - Jun 10, 2017

Set Reminder 2017-06-09 10:00:00 2017-06-10 10:00:00 America/New_York Bidsquare Bidsquare : American History, Featuring the Property of N. Flayderman & Co. https://www.bidsquare.com/auctions/cowans/american-history-featuring-the-property-of-n-flayderman-co-2392
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• Lot Description

  Leather album, 7 x 8.75 in., containing 140 CDVs, both original "from life" photographs as well as commercially printed portraits of some of the most important and influential personalities of the second half of the 19th century, with index at front identifying over 100 individuals pictured in the album. The CDVs are credited primarily to photographers in New York, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts, such as Mathew Brady, Napoleon Sarony, J.W. Hurn, F. Gutekunst, and spirit photographer William H. Mumler, and a number include 2 cent internal revenue stamps on verso. The theme of this collection overlaps between an interest in abolitionists, suffragettes and women’s rights activists, religious and social reformers, and spiritualists. The album was likely put together between the 1860s-1880s and reflects the rise in interest in spiritualism and social reform following the Civil War.

  Notable personalities include: 

  Abolitionists, Suffragettes, Women's Rights Activists, & Reformers

  Sojourner Truth, rare portrait in which she holds her knitting to the camera. With imprint, I sell the Shadow to Support the Substance/ Sojourner Truth, verso with imprint of Wright's New York Gallery / Battlecreek, Mich.  

  Robert Smalls, enslaved African American who emancipated himself from slavery during the Civil War by commandeering a Confederate transport ship, CSS Planter, in Charleston Harbor and sailing it from Confederate-controlled waters to the US Blockade. He gained his freedom and later served as US Representative from South Carolina. By B.F. Reimer, Philadelphia. 

  Dr. Mary Edwards Walker, feminist, abolitionist, alleged spy, Civil War POW, and surgeon. To date, Walker is the only female and one of only eight civilians to receive the Medal of Honor, which was presented to her for her heroic efforts during the Civil War. By Broadbent & Phillips, Philadelphia.

  Views of the Slave Children from New Orleans (2), sold prior to and during the Civil War to further the abolitionist cause and raise money for education of former slaves, credited to Hurn and McClees in Philadelphia.

  Additional activists include Frederick Douglass; Ebenezer Don Carlos Bassett, half black / half American Indian, first black diplomat in US; Wendell Phillips; John Brown; Gerrit Smith; Edward M. Davis; Harriet Beecher Stowe with Lyman and Henry Ward Beecher; Theodore Tilton; Dr. Henry T. Child; Dr. Hiram W. Thomas; Robert Dale Owen; Anna Elizabeth Dickinson, abolitionist and first woman to give political address to the US Congress; Robert Purvis, helped found American Anti-Slavery Society and Library Company of Colored People; William Dodge; Elizabeth Cady Stanton; Lucretia Mott (2); and Emily Faithful, English women's rights activist and publisher.

  Spiritualists

  Group of CDVs from the studio of spirit photographer, William H. Mumler, Boston, including a "self portrait with spirit, and two additional "spirit images," one with Massachusetts clairvoyant Dr. C.T. Buffum. Mumler's spirit photos are extremely rare, as he famously destroyed his negatives after P.T. Barnum ruined his career by charging him with fraud.

  Additional subjects include Mrs. Nellie J. Temple Brigham, medium from Massachusetts; Andrew Jackson Davis, spiritualist with clairvoyant powers; A.E. Mossop, spiritualist lecturer; Frances Ann Conant, American spirit medium and frequent sitter for Mumler; Dr. Henry T. Child, published spiritualist; Orson Squire Fowler and Samuel Robert Wells (autographed view), noted phrenologists. 

  Civil War Politicians & Soldiers

  Abraham Lincoln and his son Tad, famous commercially printed carte; Charles Sumner, Massachusetts Senator; Edwin Stanton, Lincoln's Secretary of War; General Benjamin F. Butler, by Anthony/Brady; Colonel John C. Fremont and his wife, Jessie Ann Benton Fremont; Confederate sympathizer Zaidee J. Bagwell; and Fanny Brown, the last of John Wilkes Booth’s “Ladies” to be identified. 

  Civil War soldiers include Colonel Nathan W. Daniels, 2nd Regiment of the Louisiana Native Guard, one of the earliest all-black regiments; Major General Henry J. Madill, 6th PA Reserves and 141st PA Volunteers, fought at Gettysburg, WIA April 1865; signed view of W.S. Vincent, 34th PA Infantry, WIA; and Charles Godfrey Leland, fought at Gettysburg and later became influential in the arts and crafts movement, by Anthony/Brady. 

  Other Personalities

  Explorers Alexander von Humboldt and Elisha Kent Kane, by Anthony/Brady; female artists Harriet Goodhue Hosmer, by Anthony/Brady, and Rosa Bonheur; Bayard Taylor, by Anthony/Brady; Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.; Victor Hugo; Charles Dickens; Henry Wadsworth Longfellow; Florence Nightingale; and famous entertainers of the day, such as the Hutchinson Family Singers, Emma J. Nichols (possibly signed), Cousin Reuben, and "Kate" Field.

  This exceptional collection of photographs is accompanied by a detailed outline of its contents, which is available upon request. 

  Condition

  Toning of the images with some sparse cases of foxing, some include handwriting on either the recto or verso of the images, many are stamped by photographers. 
• Shipping Info

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• Buyer's Premium

  • Hammer Price	Premium (%)
    $0	28.00
    $250,001	23.00
    $3,000,001	15.00