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FIRE-FIGURE ALBUM AT COBBS

By Dick Friz

PETERBOROUGH, N.H. -- Antiquarian books and rare coins led to lively bidding

at Cobbs' Coin and Book Auction at the Town House, on Tuesday, December 15,

but it was a group of significant Civil War Mementos from a Peterborough-area

estate that really snapped the crowd to attention.

A little over an hour into the sale, after all the phone bidders had been

lined up, auctioneer Charlie Cobb entertained bids for a letter written and

signed by Abraham Lincoln on "Executive Mansion" stationary and directed to a

surgeon at Harewood Hospital, Washington, D.C.

Dealers in the hall ducked out of the action early, but after a ping-pong-like

duel on the phones, dealer Daniel Weinberg of the Abraham Lincoln Book Shop,

Chicago, Ill., prevailed at $9,900.

Area dealers felt the letter had gone for a strong, definitely retail figure.

A second Lincoln letter by another consignor was withdrawn by Charlie Cobb

prior to the sale due to questionable originality.

The biggest bidding fusillade was directed at the Civil War album of Dr Reid

Brockway Boutecou containing more than 90 cartes de visites of Union military

leaders and doctors. The album proved to be the sale's capstone at $17,600,

going to a collector on the phones who requested anonymity.

While an entire row of noted dealers in the hall seemed to roll their eyes in

disbelief and folded after bidding for the album segued past the $10,000 mark,

there were four phone bidders still heavily into the fray when the ante was

raised to five figures. Several images were signed, including one by General

U.S. Grant and an "M. Barnes," who, according to sources, seems to be Maj.

James Barnes, appointed US Surgeon General in 1864.

Jonathan Mann, publisher of the The Rail Splitter, a journal for the Lincoln

collector believes that the real keeper in the album was an unsigned, Brady

Studio image of Lincoln's eight-year-old son Willie, who tragically succumbed

soon after the photo session, in February 1862, to what was believed to be

typhoid fever. That image alone would command from $4,000 to $5,000, according

to Mann.

Another entry, from the same consignor, was a rather macabre wallet of Dr Reid

Boutecou, apparently an Army surgeon. In addition to a few needles, the wallet

contained a number of carefully wrapped coins with a scrawled notation that

they'd been removed after a mini ball or bullet fragment had propelled them

from a hapless soldier's pocket and embedded them into his groin. A left bid

of $220 captured this grim memento.

The sale also yielded a fine edition of Phair's Atlantic Salmon Fishing (1937)

from the prestigious Derrydale Press, which was reeled in at $550 after fierce

bidding byplay by three dealers in the hall. An imposing photo collection of

images of the British Royal Family tallied $962.50. Coin enthusiasts clamored

for a superb US album of 1950-1958 proof sets, chasing it to $935.

Charlie Cobb's burgeoning auction firm received a lot of press in late October

when a framed oil painting of a peasant woman signed by American artist George

Hitchcock commanded $154,000 including buyer's premium. Recently Cobb

announced plans to hold two important auctions each month.

For information, 603/924-6361.