Goldberg Coins and Collectibles

Sale 43

Manuscript and Collectibles Auction

World Leaders

Lot	Photo	Description	Realized
Lot 328		Ben-Gurion, David (1876-1973) One of the most influential figures in modern Zionism; founder of the State of Israel; first (1948-1952) and third prime minister (1955-1962) of Israel. Two ALsS, 1p each, 7½"x6" and 7¾"x5½", Hakirya and Tel Aviv, 1955 July 8 and 1964 Dec. 3. Both are very fine, with normal folds; the two are matted with a commemorative bank note bearing Ben-Gurion's likeness and issued by the American Israel Numismatic Association in 1988; framed to an overall size of 26¾"x22". Both letters have excellent content. The first, written as Minister of Defense on personal stationery to Yaakov Riftin, a member of the Knesset, says, in part: "You do not have permission to speak in the name of the Mapai [the political party which was dominant in Israeli politics until the mid 1960s, when it merged into the Alignment] voters. We live in a land in which the voter is definitely free to vote for whomever he wants….We have walked along this path from the beginning of the Zionist enterprise….I am certain that this path will be a blessing for both the workers and the people…." The second letter, to Mordechai Soskis, says in part: "The Party is dear to me….But the people and its existence depend on the purity of the State, and if I am to stand before these two things - I will not hesitate for one moment, and I will fight for the purity of the State…." Estimated Value $3,000 - 4,000. View details and enlarged photo	Unsold
Lot 329		Cecil, William - 1st Baron Burghley (1520-1598) Tudor statesman; chief advisor of Queen Elizabeth I; Lord High Treasurer. DS ("W. Burghly"), 1p, 10¾" x 7½", n.p., n.d.(late 1500s). Very good; overall toning; dampstain down right margin touches part of text and last three letters of signature but does not affect legibility; one small tear in lower blank area; 1½" reinforcement down left margin of verso. Being a pay voucher for William Robinson, the Queen's messenger. Estimated Value $500 - 750. View details and enlarged photo	Realized $630
Lot 330		O'Connell, Daniel (1775-1847) Irish nationalist leader; called "the Liberator"; he was elected M.P. in 1828 but could take his seat only after the passage of the Catholic Emancipation Act (1829). ALS, 2½pp, 9" x 7¼", 1832 June 10. To Lord Ebington, regarding a derogatory opinion of Benjamin Disraeli expressed by O'Connell. In part: "…when I wrote to Mr. Bulwer expressing the opinion I entertain of Mr. Disraeli, I had no recollection…that so excellent a friend of civil and religious liberty as Mr. Smith was Sir Jno Baring's colleague at Wycombe. It was far from my mind that…the letter of so humble an individual as myself could be deemed of importance at Wycombe when I am not personally known to any one human being…." There was no love lost between O'Connell and Disraeli. In 1835 they would quarrell publicly, to the point of almost fighting a duel, over reports that Disraeli had called O'Connell a "traitor and incendiary." During a heated exchange in Parliament, O'Connell disparaged Disraeli's Jewish ancestry, to which Disraeli responded: "Yes, I am a Jew and when the ancestors of the right honourable gentleman were brutal savages in an unknown island, mine were priests in the temple of Solomon." Estimated Value $400 - 600. View details and enlarged photo	Realized $504
Lot 331		Rabin, Yitzhak and Abba Eban. Group of four photographs. Yitzhak Rabin (1922-1996) signed in blue marker on two 4½" x 7" photos, one showing him with Arnold Schwarzenegger (minor residue at upper left) and another with Barbra Streisand and David Geffen. Both photos are laid to blue paper. A 4¼" x 7¼" photo of Israeli diplomat Abba Eban (1915-2002) with an unidentified military officer is signed on the lower mount, damaged edges. With an unsigned 6½" x 9¼" color photo of President Bill Clinton, outside the White House, watching the historic and fateful handshake between Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat (1929-2004); laid down, else fine. (4 items). Estimated Value $300 - 400. View details and enlarged photo	Realized $196
Lot 332		Santa Anna, Antonio Lopez de (1794-1876) Mexican president and general; killed the defenders of the Alamo in 1836, including Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie, and William Barrett Travis. Extremely rare DS ("Ant. Lopez de Santa Anna") as President of Mexico, 20pp, in Spanish, 13" x 8¾", Mexico City, 1833 Nov. 11. Old damp stains have blackened the top edge of the document, affecting a few lines of text and the top of the "A" in the signature; the five conjoined sheets are separated and the file holes are enlarged; the last six pages have tears and small areas missing at the top, affecting a few words; most of the document is clearly legible. A treaty of Friendship, Commerce, and Navigation between Mexico and Peru. The treaty, concluded by the ministers of the two countries at Lima Nov. 16, 1832, gives most favored nation status ("nación mas favorecida") by each country to the other, granting free movement of citizens (except for criminals, who must be detained and returned), use of each other's ports, the same tariffs for import/export, etc., and other mutual considerations. This is the first such Santa Anna document we have seen. Estimated Value $3,000 - 5,000. View details and enlarged photo	Realized $2,300
Lot 333		Stalin, Joseph (born Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili) (178-1953) General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee from 1922 until his death in 1953; one of the most ruthless dictators of all time. ALS ("Iosif"), 1p, in Georgian, 8¼" x 5¼", n.p., 1930 Jan. 6. To his mother, Ekaterina Geladze, Stalin writes: "Hello Mom, How are you doing? What's new? I received the preserves. Thanks Mom. I was a little sick but now I'm better. Nadya [Nadezhda Alliluyeva, who committed suicide in 1932] and the kids [Vasiliy, a son, and Svetlana, a daughter] are also doing well. Hello from Nadya. I wish you a long life. Yours, Joseph." He adds, "Hello to Alex and Basil and everybody I know." The letter is written in dark blue ink on half of a larger sheet and folded; the page is creased and toned, with chipping around the edges and separation at center fold; the entire page is laid to a second sheet for reinforcement. Very boldly penned and signed. Stalin was the son of an an ex serf, Ekaterina Geladze, and an illerate Georgian cobbler, Vissarion Dzhugashvili, who beat his wife and son and abandoned them when Stalin was about ten years old. Stalin's mother wanted him to become a priest, and he did attend the Seminary of Tiflis because he received a sholarship, but he quit before finishing and became a professional revolutionary, adopting the name "Stalin," (from the Russian word for "steel") in 1913 and rising through the ranks of the Communist Party after the Bolsheviks seized power in 1917. In 1922 he was elected general secretary of the Communist Party, a position that allowed him to build an apparatus loyal to him. Although Lenin thought Stalin a competent administrator, he was critical of him as a theoretician, and recommended, before his death, that Stalin be removed from his position, in favor of Trotsky. The document was suppressed after Lenin's death and by the late 1920s, Stalin had maneuvered himself into position as the country's sole leader. During World War II Stalin met with Roosevelt and Churhill at Tehran in 1943 and with Truman, Churchill and Attlee at Potsday in 1945; his negotiations maneuvered the Soviet Union into a position of hegemony in Eastern Europe after the war and he established the Soviet Union as a rival with the United States for world leadership. Nonetheless, Stalin's legacy is one of totalitarianism and the murder of millions of Soviet citizens. Stalin's relationship with his mother and the rest of his family has been the subject of much debate. He installed his mother in a palace in the Caucasus before her death and wrote short letters, such as this one, to her in Georgian (she never learned to read Russian), but when she died in 1937, he did not attend her funeral. ABPC has records of only three Stalin ALsS sold at auction. The last one sold for $39,000 plus the buyer's premium at Christie's in 2006. Estimated Value $10,000 - 15,000. View details and enlarged photo	Realized $8,050
Lot 334		(Three Israeli Statesmen). 8" x 10" Photograph signed in English and Hebrew by Yitzhak Rabin ("Y. Rabin") and Moshe Dayan ("M. Dayan") in blue ink and by Ariel Sharon in black ink, n.p., n.d. Dayan signed at the top of the photo; Sharon and Rabin signed on the green paper to which the photo is glued down. Very good; one scratched spot and some corner creasing or loss. Estimated Value $300 - 500. View details and enlarged photo	Realized $460
Lot 335		Trotsky, Leon (1879-1940) Bolshevik revolutionary and Marxist theorist; in the early days of the Soviet Union he was People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, then founder and commander of the Red Army and People's Commissar of War. After Lenin's death, Trotsky was defeated in a struggle with Stalin for control of the Communist Party; he was expelled from the party and deported from Russia. He lived in exile in Mexico, where he was assassinated by a Soviet agent. TDS ("L Trotsky") in blue pencil, 3pp (separate), in Russian, 13" x 8", 1928 Oct. 16. Very good; punch holes along the left margin have torn, minimally affecting a few letters of the text. The document holds the minutes of a military meeting attended by Lev Borisovich Kanenev, Sergey Vasilyevich Llebedev, and others. Estimated Value $1,000 - 1,250. Superior Stamp & Coin, May 3, 1998, Lot 479. View details and enlarged photo	Realized $805
Lot 336		Wilberforce, William (1759-1833) Member of the House of Commons whose driving force in life was the abolition of slavery. ALS twice ("W Wilberforce"), 4pp, 7¼" x 4¼", 13 Artillery Place, "Saty night." Inviting an unknown person to tea and with some religious content. Fine; with an engraved portrait. Estimated Value $100 - 200. View details and enlarged photo	Realized $391
Lot 337		World Leaders - Qaddafi, Mubarak, Rajiv Ghandi & Others. A group of eight signed photographs sent, upon request, to the Russian Language Honors Class at Watervliet High School in New York, all but one in 1988. All very fine; various sizes. The leaders include Libyan leader Muammar El-Qaddafi, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Ghandi, Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, South African President P.W. Botha, Chairman of the Council of the German Democratic Republic, Austrian President Kurt Waldheim, and British Speaker of the House of Commons Betty Boothroyd (1998). Every photo but Waldheim's has an accompanying letter from the leader's office. Estimated Value $500 - 600. View details and enlarged photo	Unsold