$594,000 for copy of documents

Press, 3 November 1984, Page 5

$594,000 for copy of documents

NZPA-Reuter New York

The American businessman and publisher, Malcolm Forbes, has paid a record $U5297,G00 ($594,000) for a copy of the Emancipation Proclamation signed by President Abraham Lincoln, Sotheby’s auction house said. The document was one of 48 “authorised” replicas of the 1863 decree by which Lincoln freed the slaves. The 48 reproductions, printed to raise money for victims of the Civil War, were autographed by Lincoln and his Secretary of State, William Seward. Mr Forbes also brought a 1779 letter by President George Washington outlining procedures a newly recruited Intelligence Officer should use in spying on the British headquarters in New York City. The letter fetched SUSI2I,OOO ($242,000), more than double the record for a Washington letter, Sotheby’s said.

An anonymous buyer paid $U517,600 ($35,200) for a $5 cheque written by President Lincoln to “a coloured man with one leg.” The auction house called it “one of the most famous bank cheques ever drawn by a chief executive.”