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The journal of Aaron Thomas is a 374 page leather-bound volume containing approximately 367 pages of handwritten material. The journal begins on June 15, 1798 and concludes on October 26, 1799, and chronicles the experiences and adventures of a British seaman serving in the Royal Navy aboard HMS Lapwing in the West Indies during the French Revolutionary wars. The journal contains insightful, first-hand accounts of naval operations, customs of the day, and humorous, detailed anecdotes involving shipmates and superiors. Thomas, who joined the navy in 1793, includes entries regarding the health and punishment of the men aboard ship, as well as his personal views on slavery, religion, and morality. With the exception of the final three pages, all entries are written in Thomas's hand.

"A very interesting and highly detailed letter regarding the invasion of Curacao, Netherlands Antilles, in September 1800, dated Philadelphia, from William Hampton to Robert Ralston. Hampton was the commander of the merchant brig, Sally, of Philadelphia, Robert Ralston whom the letter is addressed was during the fight to drive the French off, for which he was acclaimed in the contemporary letter copy addressed to the Secretary of State, John Marshall, Marshall in 1800 helped negotiate the Convention of 1800, also known as the Treaty of Mortefontaine, which put an end to the skirmishes between the two countries in the Caribbean which had been going on since the XYZ affair. The type of skirmishes described in these manuscripts." -The New Antiquarian

The late Helen C. Purdy, professor emeritus and former head of the Archives and Special Collections Department, donated a variety of library materials following her retirement in 1991. This collection consists of maps of Florida and the West Indies.

Flyer advertising the Haitian American Historical Society's embarkment on constructing a statue for General Georges (Jorge) Biassou.

"Letter, in French, concerning a financial dispute concerning slaves bought by a French trader on Guadeloupe from an English slave ship and then sold on a sailors to another English vessel. The English vessel, a slave ship, is named." -The New Antiquarian

"A letter from the Thoré brothers, Louis and B. Thoré to their father Paul Thoré, Paul Thoré was originally from Gers, left in the middle of the eighteenth century for Martinique and settled in St. Pierre, where he made a fortune as a trader. His children were born there. He returned to Gers in 1792, where he bought property newly confiscated by the State - the Abbaye de Flaran and the Chateau de Cassaigne. The Thoré brothers write about the seizure of their vessel by the English and discuss the use of Danish ships as neutral vessels." -The New Antiquarian

"A very important deed between Sir William Templer Pole, of co. Devon; Scrope Berdmore, Andrew Berkeley Drummond, of Middx.; George Templer, of co. Middx.; William Lowndes Stone, of co. Oxford; and Owen Putland, Meyrick of the Isle of Anglesea; relates to an agreement between the above-mentioned parties concerning several plantations and lands in several parishes in the island of St. Christopher, written on three large skins of parchment, with signatures and seals of all parties, dated 1807." –description adhered to the front of the document.

"This indenture dated 23 June 1807 concerns a mortgage on two sugar plantations on the Caribbean island of St. Kitts: NicholaTown plantation in the parish of Christ Church, NicholaTown, and Golden Rock plantation in the parish of St. Peter Basseterre, with the related utensils, slaves & cattle. The indenture recites extracts from various deeds charting the ownership of the plantations back to John Mills of Woodford in 1750s." –description from Samuel Gedge, bookseller

"Saint Croix (Christiansted): Peter Lake Clarke, Friday, Oct. 2, 1812...Single issue of this rare Caribbean newspaper, containing sale and rental advertisements, as well as official announcements. Several of the listings are printed in both Danish and English. Of the eight announcements for auctions of estates and property, six detail the sale of slaves. The climate of the region has resulted in few of these publications surviving. Newspaper printing on St. Croix began in the early 19th century..." –Description from William Reese Company

"This indenture of 1814-15 records the assignment to the wealthy slave owner and politician Christopher Bethell Cordington by the trustees and grandson of Sir Peter Parker the rights to a sugar planation on Antigua called Skerretts. The document recites details concerning the history of ownership of the estate. Numbering 500 acres in the parish of St. John, it was named after owner Robert Skerrett and later became known as Clare Hall estate." –Description from Samuel Gedge, bookseller

The Charles Creighton Collection contains an illuminated manuscript on parchment, signed by Charles VI, last of the house of Habsburg, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Bohemia and Hungary-Croatia. It was the property of Prince Max of Baden until the end of the first World War.

The 33-page manuscript measures 8 by 11 inches, with illuminated borders in red, blue, and gold, and an artistically designed title in black and gold of royal insignia surrounded by implements of war and the crown of the king. The manuscript is bound in a gilded hand-embroidered binding of decorative design with ornamental ribbon ties and tinsel fringes. It is attached with a gold braided cord is the Royal Seal of Charles VI, measuring 4 1/4 inches in diameter with the inscription "Carolus VI Romanorum Imperator S. A. Hispaniarum et utriusque Siciliae Rex." The seal is enclosed in a decorated silver case which is intended to rest in a circular compartment in the center of a tooled Viennese leather binding in which the manuscript reposes. The manuscript is written entirely in Latin and confers the title of Marquis on Honuphrium Ianno Ernandes Arias for "Militiaque multa suae Fides, Constantia Sapienta, ac Fortitudinis Specima edidissent..." (translation: In long military service he displayed Faith, Constancy, Prudence, and Courage...) To legalize the document, it is signed in the autograph of King Charles VI "Yo el Rey," below which are the signatures of noblemen and dignitaries of state.

Included also are 15 separate pages of manuscript written in Latin. These pages also refer to the Marquis and are dated in May of 1731. An unsigned manuscript by one of the Ianno family consists of 5 lines and is written in French.

The Charles Creighton Collection also contains high quality facsimiles of several historical predominantly French documents from the 17th and 18th century. These are: a letter pleading for a 3 day postponement of Louis XIV's execution by Louis XIV dated January 20, 1793; two letters informing French generals of the Waterloo victory by the Duke of Wellington, dated June 14 and June 20, 1815; Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson's unfinished letter to Lady Hamilton, dated October 19, 1805; Napoleon's appeal to England for protection after his defeat at Waterloo, dated July 13, 1815; a note written by Marie Antoinette written just before her execution in 1793; and the last letter written by Robespierre, unfinished due to his being shot, with bloodstains at the bottom of the letter, dated July 27, 1794.

"Attorney Charles Baldwin reassures his client, Gelston, U.S. Collector of Customs for the Port of New York under Presidents Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe, that Congress would pass a bill to pay the $130,000 court judgement against him in the case of the ship American Eagle. Eight years earlier, Gelston had seized the vessel, which was being fitted out in New York to carry arms or supplies to Alexandre Petion, first President of the Republic of Haiti, who was then locked in civil war with his rival, Henri Christophe. Gelston maintained that he was merely following orders from Washington, being told that President Madison believed the ship was being 'fitted out for illegal purposes' as defined by the 1794 Neutrality Act, which forbade any 'military expedition or enterprise,' including a 'foreign vessel,' from being 'set on foot' within U.S. territory against 'any foreign prince or state.' After the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the judgment against Gelston, his only recourse was to petition Congress to appropriate funds to pay the judgment in favor of the ship's owner. Baldwin was certain that in light of the 'gross injustice' of the court judgment, Congress would appropriate the money to compensate Gelston for his legal debt. This proved to be correct. One month later, the bill passed the House of Representatives by the narrow vote of 59 to 60.

Coincidentally, it was the same month that Alexandre Petion died from yellow fever. Though none of the contemporary news reports of the American Eagle case mentioned the political complications that may have influenced the seizure of the vessel, Petion was a 'quadroon,' a free mean 'of color,' born to a wealthy French father and a mixed-race mother. Despite his exalted status in the 'Black Slave Republic,' Petion, as President, 'often showed support for the oppressed;' he seized commercial plantations from the rich gentry, redistributed land to his supporters and the peasantry, and established the foundation for a system of public education. One wonders if these principles made him unpalatable to President Madison, the wealthy slave-owner, and may have led to Washington's order to prevent the American Eagle from sailing to Petion's support.

Gelston himself had been caught in the middle of the legal muddle which ensued. He was himself a New York lawyer and politician who had served in the Continental Congress before first being appointed to the Collector's position, a powerful political plum, by President Jefferson. He remained in office for two more years after being saved by Congress from a debtor's prison, and before his death in 1828, he was considered for a seat on on the U.S. Supreme Court." –Michael Brown Rare Books

Thomas Jefferson (1742-1826) was the primary author of the Declaration of Independence (1776), Governor of Virginia (1779-1781), the first Secretary of State (1790-1793), second Vice-President of the United Sates (1797-1801), the third President of the United States (1801–1809), the founder of the University of Virginia (1819), and one of the most influential Founding Fathers.

The Thomas Jefferson collection includes four letters by Thomas Jefferson, three official documents, an entry of merchandise, a biography, and twenty-six printed portraits.

"Group of 7 documents relating to Jean-Pierre Boyer and his Presidency. Vp, 1808-25.

Jean-Pierre Boyer was the longest-tenured Haitian Leader of his era, serving as president from 1818 to 1843. Under his rule, the competing northern and southern parts of Haiti were united, and Spanish Haiti (now the Dominican Republic) was annexed.

This lot includes: Receipt for the sale of a horse to General Bazelais, possibly signed by Boyer as a lieutenant colonel, 4 July 1808, and then signed over on verso by Bazelais to General Delva, 1809 Receipt signed by General Boyer to Madame Daran for a horse, 24 October 1811 Pair of documents regarding a requisition submitted by C. Babeuf, one endorsed with General Boyer's signature and the other by President Petion, 15 April 1815 Pair of documents signed by Joseph Latortue in the northern part of Haiti, the first as a baron while the north was still an independent kingdom, the second as administrator under Boyer's united Haiti, 26 April 1817 and 11 February 1823 Receipt on official letterhead signed by President Boyer, issued to General Benjamin Noel for a house purchased from the state, 16 July 1825." -Libreria de Antano, Buenos Ayres

The Lemuel Adams Papers contains a ledger belonging to Lemuel Adams. There are logged transactions from 1792 to 1804, mostly from Hartford, Connecticut; however, the ledger also contains letters written by Adams, a genealogy of the Adams family, and a few dozen poems by Adams with titles ranging from "On Life" to "Description of the Tea Party."

"A vital text by one of Britain's leading abolitionists, demanding immediate abolition and calling for a sugar boycott to drive transformative change. First published in 1824, this anonymous tract was written by Elizabeth Heyrick (1769-1831), the radical Quaker abolitionist and reformist pamphleteer. Heyrick once described the idea of gradual emancipation as 'the very master-piece of satanic policy.'

In the present text, Heyrick pleaded with England's citizens to consider the plight of the enslaved in the British West Indies and to boycott all 'slave-made sugar' even if there were 'no other sugar to be had in the world.'

Heyrick encouraged consumers to buy sugar from the East Indies where 'its cultivation is less oppressive, where the cultivators are free -and like you receive wages for their labour...Buy your sugar of those who will not attempt to deceive you. Tell the shopkeepers you will have PURE (unmixed) EAST INDIA SUGAR or none at all...'

Heyrick's comparison between the stolen labor of enslaved individuals in the West Indies and the British working class was deliberate. As early as 1819, she had written of the need to recognize that the labors of the working class 'ought to be considered int he eye of the law as PROPERTY; the poor have no other, and it should be regarded as sacred.'

Expressing these views two years after David Ricardo's Principles of Political Economy (1817), Heyrick, like other radical reformers, 'seized on this theory of value and used it to attack the developing capitalist system for denying human labour its just reward.' (Corfield)

As one might expect, No British Slavery...effectively describes the horrors of slavery. It also touches on the Demerara Rebellion of 1823. A large cut on the title-page shows a semi-naked woman being flogged as an enslaved family (an infant seated on the ground, a small child, an older child, husband, wife) are forced to watch the scene unfold. In the background, two hanged individuals likely reference the events at Demerara.

In 1827, the Sheffield female anti-slavery society bought and distributed 2,000 copies of Heyrick's tract, causing dissatisfaction among certain male abolitionists, some including the spouses or brothers of these women. These men fretted that the 'sugar boycott would be ineffective and immediate emancipation disastrous' -a premise that the Sheffield women refuted by reiterating their call for abolition to take place 'without reserve, without limitation, without delay.' (Corfield)

Heyrick's influence on American abolitionists was profound. Her text Immediate, Not Gradual Abolition; or, an Inquiry into the Shortest, Safest, and Most Effectual Means of Getting Rid of West Indian Slavery, also published in 1824, was widely reprinted in the States.

Frederick Douglass lectured in 1850 that Heyrick had the 'head of a prophetess, and the heart of an angel...She taught that what is right, is reasonable; and that what ought to be done, can be done, and that immediate emancipation was the right of the slave and the duty of the master. Her heavenly counsel was heeded." --description from Ian Brabner, Rare Americana

"The Fanny Kemble Playbill Collection is a collection of 28 playbills from 1829-1832, comprising of her years on the English stage and including her first performance on any stage. Fanny Kemble (Frances Ann Kemble, 1809-1893), the daughter of the actors Charles and Marie Kemble, was born in London on November 27, 1809. She made her first appearance on the stage when she appeared as Juliet in her father's production of "Romeo and Juliet" on October 5, 1829. Fanny was a great success, and this role was followed by several others in her father's Covent-Garden Theatre. She played all the principal women's parts, notably Portia, Beatrice, and Lady Teazle. Most of the performances were at Theatre Royal Covent-Garden with a few few performances at Theatre Royal Edinburgh where she performed with her brother on a tour in June of 1830." -Golden Legend, Inc.