Description:

Slavery
Clay County, MO, October 8, 1858
Slave Auction Broadside to Pay Off Debts, Ironically Misspells "Slaves"
Broadside

An early printer's copy of a slave auction broadside. 1p, measuring 9.25" x 10.5", Clay County, Missouri, dated October 8, 1858. Letterpress broadside, advertising the sale of nine enslaved people, aged 5 to 70 and "all likely and under good character." Signed in text by George E. Claybrook and Thomas M. Gosney as administrators of the estate of James L. Hickman "to pay the debts of said estate." The broadside has several early ink marks to correct misspellings and grammatical errors. For example, large bold-faced advertisement reads "Sale of Saves" rather than "Sale of Slaves", "eatate" instead of "estate", and "manny" instead of "many". The broadside has slightly rough edges. Paper loss at the lower left corner has been professionally conserved with archival paper. Scattered foxing and staining. Ink emendations throughout.

The division of enslaved persons at the death of a slaveowner often led to the division of families and at the very least broke up slave communities, where individuals had lived and worked together, often for their entire lives. Such divisions often led to sales when the new owner could not profitably employ the enslaved persons they had inherited. These sales further broke family and community ties.

This broadside also shows the irony of slavery, where a representative of an allegedly superior race is still unable to spell the word "slave".

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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  • Dimensions: 9.25" x 10.5"
  • Medium: Broadside

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July 16, 2025 10:00 AM EDT
Wilton, CT, US

University Archives

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