?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 3,000 - $ 4,000
SLAVE DEALER'S BUSINESS CARD (SLAVERY AND ABOLITION--SLAVE DEALERS.) Hill, Ware & Chrisp. Great Negro Mart No. 57 Adams Street, Memphis Tennessee. Business card, 1-7/8 x 4 inches, printed on glazed white paper-covered cardstock, with a note in ink of the reverse from co-owner hillman chrisp. The card is in excellent condition. Memphis, circa 1860-1861
A very scarce slave dealer's calling card, with an exceptional association. Nathan Bedford Forrest (1821-1877) is best known for his post war connection with the birth of the Ku Klux Klan. But before the war he was a wealthy businessman and owner of a large slave yard at Adams Street in Memphis. Attached to that slave yard was his large and impressive residence. In July of 1859, he sold the house and the attached slave yard to Byrd Hill, friend and business associate. Messrs Hill and Company even cited the fact that the yard had belonged to Forrest in their later advertising. The card bear an interesting note on the reverse "Strand (?) G. Jones, send me a vile of fine branday (sic), Hillman Chrisp" - beneath that, a florid signature "R. Griffith."
