Lot 4451
Stowe, Harriet Beecher (1811-96) American author, best known for the very influential, anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin. Autograph Quotation Signed, n.p., February 9, 1894, on an 8 x 6 in. album leaf. There is slight residue at the left edge of the leaf and a couple of minor blemishes; otherwise, it is a fine, attractive piece, boldly penned and signed.
In full: "Not one throb of anguish / Not one tear of the oppressed / Tis forgotten by the Man of / Sorrows the Lord of Glory. / In his patient generous bosom / He bears the anguish of a world. / Uncle Tom's Cabin / Chap 12th / Harriet Beecher Stowe / Feby 9th 1894."
The context in which this quotation appears in the book involves the riverboat trip on which the slave trader Haley conducted Tom and other Kentucky slaves southward to be sold as plantation hands. At Louisville, Haley surreptitiously sold for forty dollars the baby of the newly-traded slave woman Lucy when she briefly left it in hopes of finding her husband at the wharf. Devastated, she committed suicide by jumping into the Ohio River that night; Tom was a witness to her suicide and the above passage immediately follows. Mrs. Stowe obviously intended it as a powerful statement. The acceptance at face value of Uncle Tom's Cabin by people in the north was a major factor in influencing opinion and in the development of the climate leading to the Civil War. When Mrs. Stowe met President Lincoln, he is said to have commented something along the lines of, "So you are the little lady who started this big war."
Estimated Value $4,000 - 6,000.
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| Realized $3,220 |
