Our last auction: Cricket, Football & Sporting Memorabilia including Part 1 of The David Frith Collection
Knights Auctioneers last auction was held on Saturday and Sunday, 18th and 19th March 2023.
The sale included over 1500 lots and we have included some highlights below.
To view the results of the March auction click here
Our next sale: The Cricket Collection of Lord Botham: Ian Terence Botham, Somerset, Worcestershire, Durham & England
Saturday 15th July 2023
The Long Room, The Oval, Kennington, London
An important private collection of over 200 lots of cricket memorabilia collected by Botham during his illustrious playing career. Viewing on Friday 14th July from 3pm.
Catalogue coming soon
Lot 373 – William Gilbert Grace. Gloucestershire & England 1865-1908. Albert Chevallier Tayler 1905. Original and unpublished drawing on brown paper in pencil and coloured chalk of Grace in batting pose wearing cap and waist tie/belt in M.C.C. colours of red and yellow. Grace is depicted with bat raised standing at the wicket waiting to receive the delivery. The drawing signed in pencil to the right hand side lower border by Chevallier Tayler and dated 1905 and signed by Grace to the left hand side lower border. A unique signed unpublished original drawing of Grace by Chevallier Tayler. Hammer Price £16,000
Lot 429 – John Thomas Brown. Yorkshire & England 1889-1904. Crawford's 'The Exceller' cricket bat used by Jack Brown in scoring his only Test match century and scoring the fastest ever fifty in Test cricket in 28 minutes in the fifth Test match v Australia played at Melbourne on the 1st, 2nd, 4th to 6th March 1895. The bat is inscribed to the face of the bat 'J.T. Brown made his 140 .. .. in the great England v Australia match at Melbourne 1895 with this Crawford bat’. Hammer Price £24,000
Lot 42 – 'Kent County Cricket Champions 1906'. Rare official menu for the 'Dinner to the Kent XI' celebrating Kent winning their first ever County Championship in 1906. The Banquet held at Hotel Cecil on 11th October 1906. The menu signed in pencil to the first page by nineteen members of the Kent playing staff of the 1906 season. Signatures include C.H.B. Marsham (Cpt), Woolley, Hubble, Fairservice, Hutchings, Fielder, Dillon, Blythe, Burnup, Alec Hearne, Mason, Walter Hearne etc. A very scarce and desirable item of Kent cricketing history especially in this signed form. Hammer Price £2,200
Lot 421 – Donald George Bradman. New South Wales, South Australia & Australia 1927-1949. A pair of batting gloves presented to David Frith by Don Bradman at the Lord's Taverners reception and Dinner held at the London Hilton on the 13th May 1974. The white leather gloves, both with brown 'sausage shaped' finger and thumb protection are an odd pair of gloves in that the left hand glove has the label of Slazenger ‘Len Hutton’ and the right hand glove has the label of ‘Grasshopper Sports Goods. By Frank Bryan Ltd of Worcester’. Both appear well used and are presumed to have been worn by Bradman at some point in the latter years of his playing career. Hammer Price unsold
Lot 407 – Clarence Victor 'Clarrie' Grimmett. Wellington, Victoria, South Australia & Australia 1911-1941. Australian green wool Test cap with Australian emblem to front with kangaroo and emu embroidered in metal thread and coloured thread with the legend 'Advance Australia' in scroll worn by Grimmett in the 1924/25 Test series played in Australia. The cap, by Harding's Mercury, Hunter Street, Sydney, with label inside with name handwritten 'C.V. Grimmett' in black ink. A very rare cap from this Ashes Test series. Hammer Price £18,000
Lot 1176 – 'The Australian Cricketers' Tour through Australia, New Zealand, and Great Britain. Containing a full, racy account of the matches, dinners, excursions etc., in which they have been engaged'. By 'Argus' (P.E. Reynolds). Printed and published by A.B. Rae, Western Steam Printing Works, Bathurst, New South Wales, 1878. A rare early tour book. Hammer Price £12,000
Lot 692 – 'Ready For Chances'. A Royal Doulton Black Boy tall two handled vase, printed with a boy in spotted shirt, red waistcoat and a floppy hat, crouched awaiting a catch (as if in the slips), entitled 'Ready For Chances' and to verso, the crest 'The All Black Team'. Green floral decoration to outer rim, handle and rim decorated in green. 5.25" tall. A rarely seen 'Black Boy’ ceramic. From a selection of ‘Black Boy’ ceramics being sold in this auction. Hammer Price £1,800
Lot 417 – William Albert Stanley Oldfield, New South Wales & Australia 1919-1938. Australian Test blazer worn by Oldfield on the Australian 1930 tour of England. The green blazer, by Harding's Mercury of Sydney, with gold trimming to blazer edging, pocket and sleeves, embroidered gold and silver wire and coloured thread emblem of Australia to breast pocket with the wording 'Advance Australia' and '1930' beneath. Name handwritten to label 'W.A. Oldfield’. Hammer Price unsold
Lot 1114 – Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack 1898. 35th edition. Original hardback. Excellent condition with bright gilt titles to front board and spine paper. A rare early hardback edition. Not often seen in such wonderful condition. From a good selection of early original hardback Wisdens. Hammer Price £5,000
Lot 703 – 'Cricket at Windsor Castle meat dish'. A very rare large and impressive oval Goodwin & Harris 'Metropolitan Scenery' meat dish with juice well, with grooved drainage channels to the flat surface to direct the juices flow, printed in blue and embellished with a scene of Windsor Castle and the Thames to foreground featuring a cricket match to the foreground with trees and foliage to sides. Printed mark in blue to base 'Metropolitan Scenery, Windsor Castle' with impressed numbers 4 & 18. The dish measuring 19" wide by 15.5", circa 1830/40's dish. Hammer Price £4,400
Lot 344 – West Indies tour of Australia 1930-1931. A scarce large mono official photograph of the West Indies team who toured Australia in 1930-31. The photograph laid down to photographers mount with printed title to top border 'West Indies Cricket Team - Australian Tour 1930-31' and beautifully signed in black ink by all eighteen members of the West Indies touring party, signatures include Grant (Cpt), Griffith, Headley, Roach, St. Hill, Constantine, Birkett, Martin, Bartlett, Sealey, Hunte, de Caires, The photograph by Sears' Studios of St. Kilda. An excellent and rare photograph from this inaugural tour of Australia. Hammer Price £1,800
Lot 374 – Victor Thomas Trumper. New South Wales & Australia 1894-1914. Albert Chevallier Tayler 1905. Original and unpublished drawing on brown paper in pencil and coloured chalk of Trumper in batting pose wearing Australian cap. Trumper is depicted stood at the wicket having played an off-side shot, probably the cut. The drawing signed in pencil to the right hand side lower border by Chevallier Tayler and dated 1905 and inscribed 'V.Trumper' to the left hand side lower border, probably in Tayler's hand. The drawing measures 14.5"x22". A unique unpublished original drawing of Trumper by Chevallier Tayler. Hammer Price £7,000
Lot 1211 – 'English Cricketers at Barbados. January, February and March 1897. An Account of the Cricket Matches played by Mr. Arthur Priestley and Lord Hawke's English Cricket Teams at Barbados, during the Winter of 1896/97'. A.B. Price. Printed at the West Indian Guardian, Barbados, 1897. Original decorative stiffened boards and cloth spine. [5], xvii, 86pp. Hammer Price £3,700
Lot 411 – Thomas Richardson. Surrey, London County, Somerset & England 1892-1904. Original England cloth Test cap presented to Richardson retrospectively for his Test match appearances playing for England in between 1893 and 1898. The dark blue cap, with much smaller peak than later caps, with raised wired emblem of the three lions and crown of England to front, made by H. Ludlam & Co of Albemarle Street, London. A rare and early England cap Hammer Price £2,000
Lot 1205 – '10 for 66 and all that'. Arthur Mailey. London 1958. A unique copy of Mailey's autobiography. The book which is profusely illustrated with Mailey printed cartoons of players and situations as published has in addition thirty-one of Mailey's original pen and ink drawings laid down to opposing or additional inserted pages in the book. The images include drawings of Mailey himself, Hammond, Fender, Woodfull, Noble, Grimmett, Larwood, Jardine, Armstrong, J.M. Barrie, Chapman etc, each drawing signed individually by Mailey. A wonderful, unique book presented to John Arlott by Arthur Mailey with handwritten inscription. Hammer Price £8,000
The Cricket Collection of Lord Botham: Ian Terence Botham, Somerset, Worcestershire, Durham & England
Friday 14th & Saturday 15th July 2023
The Long Room, The Oval, Kennington, London
An important private collection of over 200 lots of cricket memorabilia collected by Botham during his illustrious playing career.
Catalogue coming soon