£1,638
Rare Books, Manuscripts, Maps & Photographs ft. the Library of the Late William St Clair Pt II | 712
Auction: 28 September 2022 at 11:00 BST
autograph manuscript, written in black and red ink on wove paper, [2] 16 pp. (22.5 x 14.5cm), in a seriffed roman hand, inscribed in pencil 'to Ethel from Eric Xmas 1903' on initial blank, wood-engraved bookplates of Eric Gill and his daughter Petra Helen Gill (1906-1999), both designed by Gill, bound in green paper wrappers with manuscript title to front cover (wrappers sunned, spine chipped), housed in custom green quarter morocco solander box by Sangorski & Sutcliffe, together with a pencil sketch on a single sheet of wove paper (8.8 x 7.8cm), unsigned, in envelope with typescript label 'Eric Gill, Pencil Sketch, "Mother & Child"'
Note: Inscribed by Gill apparently to his future wife Ethel 'Ettie' Moore (1878-1961, later known as Mary) a year before their marriage. Ethel was the daughter of the sacristan at Chichester cathedral and a fellow student at Chichester Technical and Art School. It was in 1903 that 'a number of commissions for inscriptional carvings on tombstones and memorial tablets convinced [Gill] that he could make a living from letter-cutting and monumental masonry' (ODNB).
Provenance: Property of an English collector.