BOY

[The Birth of the Scout Movement?: R. B. Haldane and Baden-Powell’s ‘scheme’.] Typed Note with cyclostyled sigature from the future Lord Chancellor Richard Burdon Haldane to ‘General Baden-Powell’, regarding a meeting with Sir Edward Ward.

Author: 
[The Birth of the Scout Movement? R. B. Haldane [Richard Burdon Haldane (1856-1928), 1st Viscount Haldane, Lord Chancellor] [Lord Baden-Powell [Sir Robert Baden-Powell (1857-1941)]; the Boy Scouts]
Publication details: 
23 May 1906. On embossed War Office letterhead.
£280.00

‘Scouting for Boys’ did not begin its serialized publication until January 1908, but Baden-Powell’s entry in the Oxford DNB states that it was Haldane, as Secretary for War, who ‘persuaded him that character training should be at the centre of any scheme of boy instruction’, following a ‘major inspection’ of the Boys’ Brigade by him as Vice-President at Glasgow in April 1904. 1p, 4to. In fair condition, lightly aged, with slight creasing and a short closed tear to one edge. Reads: ‘Dictated. / 23rd. May 1906. / Dear General Baden-Powell, / Thank you for your letter.

[Dillibe Onyeama, Nigerian author of a controversial account of the racism he experienced at Eton College in England.] Two Typed Letters Signed to Philip Dosse, publisher of ?Books and Bookmen?, one regarding the trials of a freelance reviewer.

Author: 
Dillibe Onyeama (1951-2022), Nigerian author of a controversial account of his experience of racism as the first African educated at Eton College in England [Philip Dosse (1925-1980), publisher]
Publication details: 
ONE: 15 May 1974; 47a Leigham Court Road, Streatham Hill, London SW16. TWO: no date; c/o 21 Inglethorpe Street, Fulham, London SW6. Also an ANS to 'Mrs Poppmacher' (Dosse's secretary?): 21 February 1973; 169 Breakspears Road, Brockley, London SE4.
£150.00

Onyeama was the second black boy to go to Eton, and the first to complete his education there. See his obituary in the Guardian, 11 February 2022. His hugely-controversial 1972 book ?Nigger at Eton?, which resulted in him being banned from the school, was reprinted by Penguin Books in 2020 under the title ?Black Boy at Eton?. Philip Dosse, the recipient of the first two letters, was proprietor of Hansom Books, publisher of a stable of seven arts magazines including Books and Bookmen and Plays and Players.

[Anthony Asquith, British film director.] Signed Autograph Inscription to Louis Frewen, of rHodes Hose Library, autograph collector..

Author: 
Anthony Asquith ['Puffin'] (1902-1968), film director ('The Winslow Boy', 'The Browning Version', 'Pygmalion') and aesthete, son of Liberal Prime Minister H. H. Asquith and socialite Margot Asquith
Asquith
Publication details: 
December 1931. No place.
£45.00
Asquith

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. In good condition, with light dabs of glue from mount on reverse. On 11.5 x 9 cm card with rounded edges. Clearly in response to a request for an autograph, he writes: 'For Louis Frewen / with all good wishes / from / Anthony Asquith / December 1931'.

['The old friends leave us soon or late’: a poignant lyric by the author of ‘Danny Boy’, set to music within days of the composer’s death.] Signed Autograph Score by Frederic Nicholls Löhr, of his setting of ‘Friends’ by Frederic E. Weatherly.

Author: 
Frederic N. Löhr [Frederic Nicholls Löhr] (1844-1888), composer with Plymouth connections, father of Hermann Löhr; Frederic Edward Weatherly (1848–1929), songwriter and barrister
Publication details: 
Dated by Löhr to 20 November 1888. No place.
£150.00

Painfully appropriate words (‘The old friends leave us soon or late’), set to music within days of the composer’s death. Among Weatherly’s many lyrics are ‘Danny Boy’ and ‘Roses of Picardy’. See his obituary in the Oxford DNB, and Löhr’s three-page obituary, with portrait, in the Musical Herald, London, February 1889. Löhr was the father of the composer Hermann Löhr (1871-1943). 2pp, 4to, on the facing pages of a bifolium. In fair condition, lightly aged, with a couple of closed tears unobtrusively repaired with archival tape. At head of first (left-hand) page: ‘Friends.

Letterbook of Arthur Poyser, Master of the Lord Mayor's Players and Singers, founder of the Lord Mayor's Own 1st City of London B.P. Scouts, containing letters from a number of notable individuas, drawings, programmes, cuttings and other ephemera.

Author: 
Arthur Poyser, International Commissioner for Music, Master of the Lord Mayor's Players and Singers [the Boy Players], and founder in 1908 of the Lord Mayor's Own 1st City of London B.P. Scouts
Publication details: 
Dating from between 1904 and 1938.
£450.00

Poyser was the author of the first 'Official Song-book of the Scout Movement', 'The Scout Song Book' (1912). He published a history of the Tower of London in 1908, 'when I was Master of the Music of the Collegiate Church of Allhallows Barking-by-the-Tower, City of London'. For more information, see The Times, 3 August 1964 ('Roll of Honour for Scouts'). 125 items, including letters, programmes, drawings, postcards, invitations, newspaper and magazine cuttings, relating to the Boy Players and 1st City of London Scout Troop.

[ British Women on the Home Front in the First World War. ] Mimeographed Leaflet, on Government letterhead, of poem '"The Girls They Left Behind Them" | Air -: The Minstrel Boy.'[

Author: 
[ British Women on the Home Front in the First World War; Sir Richard Harington, 12th Baronet, of Ridlington (1861-1931; Thomas Moore) ]
Publication details: 
Undated. Circa 1916.
£120.00

The item derives from the papers of Sir Richard Harington, 12th Baronet of Ridlington (1861-1931), who volunteered for the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve on the outbreak of the First World War, and was promoted to the rank of Chief Petty Officer in the Anti-Aircraft Corps, serving in that capacity until 1916. 2pp., foolscap folio. On both sides of a leaf of paper with embossed Government crest. In fair condition, lightly-aged and worn, with a few short closed tears to edges. Mimeographed duplication of a manuscript poem parodying Thomas Moore's poem 'The Minstrel Boy'.

[Sir George Baden-Powell.] Autograph Letter Signed ('George Baden-Powell') to a fellow Member of Parliament ('<Dumont?>')

Author: 
Sir George Smyth Baden-Powell (1847-1898), colonial administrator and brother of Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the Boy Scouts movement
Publication details: 
On letterhead of Coryton Park, Axminster. 26 November 1895.
£56.00

3pp., 12mo. Bifolium. In good condition, lightly-aged. He begins by thanking him for his reminder: 'Yes I should like A<?>'s laying up policy renewal - we should not set out till July'. He reports that they have 'found winter quarters' with 'fresh air & quiet', but not 'near some port for steam coaches &c.' They expect to stay there 'till Parliament calls us to London. | Let me know what I can do to help your Bill for the Autumn'.

[Printed British civil service paper.] Open Competition for registration as Boy Copyist (New Class) in the Civil Service, August, 1898. Regulations, Examination Papers, and Table of Marks.

Author: 
[Civil Service Commission, 1898; British civil service; Her Majesty's Stationery Office; Eyre and Spottiswoode]
Publication details: 
'Civil Service Commission. [All Rights Reserved.]' London: Printed for Her Majesty's Stationery Office, by Eyre and Spottiswoode, Printers to the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty. 1898.
£45.00

24pp., foolscap 8vo. With 3pp. of lithographed plates ('Copying MS.') between pp.6 and 7, giving two examples of uncorrected manuscripts for the contestants to copy out. Stitched and unbound. On aged paper, with the first and last leaves and fore-edges of plates worn and chipped at extremities. Divided into three sections: 'Regulations, &c.', 'Examination Papers' and 'Table of Marks'.

Five issues of 'The Childerley Times', illustrated juvenile manuscript magazine edited by Denis Wingfield King of Epsom, with manuscript 'Childerley Chatter' by members of the King family, and two Typed Letters Signed from King to his grandmother.

Author: 
Denis Wingfield King (b.1922) of Childerley, 8 Ridgeway, Epsom, juvenile editor of 'The Childerley Times' manuscript magazine
Publication details: 
Childerley, 8 Ridgeway, Epsom. Between 1935 and 1943.
£500.00

The eight items all in good condition, on lightly-aged paper. Each copy of 'The Childerley Times' is a unique manuscript or typescript item produced by the young D. W. King as editor, his twin sister E. W. King as sub-editor, and relatives for circulation among the family. The five issues, ranging from 1935 to 1943, all differ with regard to style and format. ONE: 19pp., 12mo. On loose leaves held together with a paper clip. Undated, but with one contribution dated 14 May 1934. No title, but first page (with pencil drawing of boy in bed with toys) reading 'SILENCE PLEASE !!

Autograph Signature of the artist, children's book illustrator and poster designer John Hassall.

Author: 
John Hassall (1868-1948), English painter, children's book illustrator and poster designer
Publication details: 
Without place or date.
£25.00

On one side of a 5.5 x 20 cm strip of laid paper, cut away from the bottom of a letter. In good condition, on lightly-aged paper, with traces of mount adhering to the reverse. Reads, in a firm attractive hand: 'Yours very sincerely | John Hassall.'

Typed Note Signed "J. Buchan" to Arthur Poyser, City of London Boy Scouts (first ever Troop by some accounts, inspired by Baden Powell's 1907 experiment), re-founder of the City of London Boy Players.

Author: 
John Buchan, novelist, later Lord Tweedsmuir, Governor-General of Canada
Publication details: 
[Headed Notepaper] Thomas Nelson and Sons Publishers, 5 November 1910
£275.00

With printed pamphlet. Letter is one page, 12mo, tipped on to page extracted from personal album of Arthur Poyser, trimmed to fit a plastci envelope, with a small nick not affecting text, illustrating his career with the City of London Boy Scouts and the Boy Players (album offered separately). Buchan is only free for luncheon on the Wednesday but would be happy to discuss "the book" [the first "Scouts' Song Book" published in 1912) with him then.

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