Auction Report: December Recap

The final auctions of 2012 are now behind us:

- At Swann Galleries' Fine Photographs and Photobooks sale on 11 December, the top lot was a San Francisco police department album containing more than 700 mugshots, which fetched $36,000.

- Sotheby's sold English Literature, History, Children's Books & Illustrations on 12 December, for a total of £1,987,850. The first edition of Gaskell's Life of Charlotte Bronte containing six manuscript Bronte letters brought the highest price, at £223,250. A collection of Mick Jagger letters came next, at £187,250. The earliest known photo album by Julia Margaret Cameron sold for £121,250, as did the gun used by Sean Connery in James Bond publicity photos. The collection of Virginia Woolf's pocket engagement diaries sold for £73,250, and the imperfect Second Folio made £37,250. The presentation copy of Emma didn't find a buyer.

- The Art of Illustration - From the Collection of Michael Winner, also at Sotheby's on 12 December, resulted in a total of £1,127,296. The top seller was an E.H. Shepard ink drawing of Christopher Robin dragging Pooh down the stairs, which sold for £139,250.

- Results for the Bloomsbury Astronomy and Space Exploration sale on 12 December are here. A first printed edition of Ptolemy's Almagest fetched the top price at £20,000.

- Sotheby's 14 December sale of Fine Books & Manuscripts, Including Americana saw a total of $2,126,632. It was the set of The Pennsylvania Evening Post for 1776, including the first newspaper printing of the Declaration of Independence that brought the highest price, selling for $722,500. An 1814 work on the Lewis and Clark expedition sold for $218,500. The first edition of Newton's Principia, first edition of Audubon's Quadrupeds, and the collection of Charles Schulz drawings and letters all failed to sell.

- PBA Galleries sold Fine Literature, Illustrated and Children's Books, and Books in All Fields on 13 December; results are here. A first printing of To Kill a Mockingbird sold for $10,800. The first edition Ulysses failed to sell.

- Bloomsbury sold Antiquarian Books and Manuscripts on 14 December; results are here.

- There were quite a few bargains to be had at the 20 December PBA Galleries sale of Treasures from Our Warehouse with Books by the Shelf. Results are here.