THE FIRST PICKWICKS

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 16 June 1928, Page 11

THE FIRST PICKWICKS

YX7HEX ir was recently reported from New York that a. first edition of Pickwick Papers, published in If) parts had been .sold at auction at the record price of £3260, the collector of the books, Mr Thomas Hatton, a retired Leicester boot and shoe manufacturer for whom they were sold, -said that he was sorry. Ho was surprised at the price, which is more than double the previous record —£1600 at a sale in Eng-land—-tint he confessed that at that moment he regretted having parted with them. Mr Hatton, who is a private collector, and formed the nucleus of the library of Leicester University College with a 'gift of 2000 valuable books, said: “Perhaps I am not so much a collector as a Dickens lover. 1 have devoted 20 years to forming this collection of 10 books —18 single -shilling issues -and one 'Christmas double number 2s issue, that are supposed to make a 20-part ‘Pickwick’ —and now it has gone. Rome Americans who were visiting England this summer heard of my collection, visited me, and persuaded and pursuaded until I said I would sell. The moment -the books were gone T began to regret my decision. “I loved Dickens as a boy and with my first few shillings began to buj

RECORD PRICE OF £3200

i. what I thought were first editions. ' Then it dawned on me that I wanted ; the paper-bound issues and not stiff covers, so 1 began to buy them. While ' hunting for the 19 copies I was continually throwing out one copy far a better one discovered somewhere, so ' that at one time I had more than 40 ■ copies on mv hands. Yon must remember that only 400 of Parts 1,2, and 3 were sold, and that When Sam Weller , arrived there was such a surge of interest. that Parts 1,2, and 3 were reprinted. ) “It was the first of 'the first edition 'that I always wanted—the first off the i machines. Thousands of such things as , broken letters nad blurs had to be searched for. T think my set partiei ularly valuable because it has the advertisements —little slips that used -to ; 'be sewn in. “I go't. one by buying up the whole ■ Dickens stock of a London bookseller, i Another time I had to buy a huge quantity of mixed books for £lO6 to get one - paper-covered copy. Although money l was not my aim, T sold off my remain- , ders at. a price that paid 'for every • Pickwick T ever bought, so that 'this £3260 is all profit. lam going on as a i Dickens -collector, but this Time not to y sell. ’ ’