Frederick Douglass Broadside Leads Anti-Slavery to Civil Rights Auction

The Hake’s Anti-Slavery to Civil Rights online auction running through June 23 features items from the 1780s through the MLK era to the Obama presidency.  

Leading the sale is a circa 1872 thin, canary-yellow broadside advertising a Maine Republican Party rally featuring the African American social abolitionist Frederick Douglass and former Maine governor and state Republican Party co-founder Israel Washburne as guest speakers. It rained that day in August 1872, thus reducing chances that the broadside would survive (estimate: $10,000-$20,000). 

Other highlights include:

• a thin cardboard placard with “I Am A Man,” in bold black ink used by protestors during the Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike in 1968 (estimate: $10,000-$20,000)
• a group of anti-slavery medallions and wall plaques dating from the 1810s to the 1830s featuring sayings and slogans such as “Am I Not A Man And A Brother,” “Am I Not A Woman And A Sister,” “The Tender Mercies of the Wicked Are Cruel,” “Thank God For Liberty,” and “O Britannia Set Us Free” (estimates range from $1,000 to $2,000)
• a French circa 1820 porcelain nautilus shell inkwell with a transferware abolitionist symbol of a kneeling enslaved woman, with a biblical verse (estimate: $1,000-$2,000)
• a French porcelain encrier or inkwell, with transferware anti-slavery images and biblical quotes (estimate: $1,000-$2,000)