?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 600 - $ 800
[Travel] Cherry, William Stamps (1869-1927) Africa, Elephant Hunting, the Ivory Trade: an Archive of Letters and Documents, circa 1899-1902. Consisting of approximately sixty-five leaves including letters, hotel receipts, and documents related to Cherry's activities in Africa at the end of the 19th century; notably a rather extraordinary letter in Cherry's hand from January of 1900 addressed to "Monsieur le Commandant de Rafai," regarding his own safety as he "had quite a quarrel with the chief this morning," stating, "I don't know whether I am safe or not. But if anything does happen, Heasyamma chief of the Breeas and his sub chiefs will be alone responsible and if your government ever has a chance, you can avenge the treachery with ten good men." Adding, "I could drive out the whole population west of the M'Bally River," and noting that the letter should not to be delivered unless Cherry himself fails to return to retrieve it.
Several receipts for the sale of ivory and correspondence regarding same with the Société Anonyme pour le Commerce Colonial in Antwerp, one from 1 October 1900 regarding a shipment received for 250 elephant tusks weighing 2,900 kilograms; some letters regarding publication of Cherry's writings; official letters from various colonial government entities of the Belgian Congo; a long letter home from May 1900 in which Cherry writes, "to hunt the elephant as I have hunted him for my existence depended on my success. And I have had in my possession seven tons of ivory in that length of time. [...] and I have lived with the natives like a native and with their means. Authorities have said it was not possible to live. I have made it practical and I believe even beneficial, and the natives I think I can furnish a treatise that will show up the African in a new light that will give homogeneity to the natives all over Africa, and a basis on which to work out the anthropological questions which are as yet unsolved.";
A large hand-drawn map; a photograph of two African men; an extraordinary treaty by which two people described as King Manda and King MZita, chiefs of Chimbuko sell their property to the Association Internationale du Congo on 13 July 1884; among other material housed in a three-ring binder and a print sleeve.
Cherry was the author of an autobiography entitled, They Called Me 'Demba Creecy'. (For more see: https://williamstampscherry.com/)
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