[This issue has no cover illustration.]
New Series No. 7. December-January
1933-34.
[1]
Wanted Best
for Boys Library, 3d. & 6d. nos Ching-Ching yarns published by T. Harrison
Roberts. For
Wanted. “Penny Dreadfuls” and fierce Boys Journals 1840 to 1900. Large collection ditto for Sale or Exchange, 3d. for list, World’s Biggest Collector, Buyer, Exchanger. Barry Ono, 100 Ferndale Road, Clapham, London.
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CAMOUFLAGED “BLOOD”
TITLES.
MY early youth was spent in the late Victorian era, when everything but the good little boys’ Boy’s Own Paper was sweepingly designated a “penny dreadful” or “pernicious literature,” when intolerant schoolmasters and parents without troubling to read them, would punish you for reading the fine historical tales of Brett in the Boys of England, Young Men of Great Britain, etc. So I used to buy the Boys Own Paper and with the title very ostentatiously displayed outside, would be reading my current number of “Sweeny Todd,” “Handsome Harry” or “Spring Heeled Jack” inside. I thought I created the dodge, but in real fact I hadn’t. Earlier on, in the Sixties, when as is alleged, they seized “The Wild Boys of London” and magistrates blamed “Charley Wag, the New Jack Sheppard” for the bulk of the juvenile crimes then perpetrated, there is no doubt the publishers of “bloods” got the wind up. I suppose E. Lloyd really commenced it in the fifties.
After issuing “Gentleman Jack,” “Claude Duval,” “Varney the Vampire” and several of the most lurid, I suppose it got a bit hot. So we come to “Ada the Betrayed” and that preceded a veritable epidemic of most sickly but certainly most innocuous “girl” titles. This lasted right up to 1889, when we got “Paul’s Perils.” Now there’s a dear little Sunday School title for you. Might be all about some sweet little cherub of a boy, who would go straight, in spite of the temptations of his naughty schoolmates, etc. In short, the male equivalent of “Jessica’s First Prayer.” But bless your heart, it was really Lloyd’s “Paul Clifford, or Hurrah! for the Road” very much abridged, and newly illustrated.
When Fox dished up Lloyd’s “String of Pearls” and rechristened it “Sweeny Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street” he made a fortune out of it, but it was the “Demon Barber” that was the touch of genius.
Now here is an instance. Published in 103 penny numbers we get Lloyd’s “The Wife’s Tragedy, or the Secrets of the Sewers of London.” When listing this, I always feel I want to be guilty of a little mendacity,
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and ignore the first title, and only use the secondary, but alas! I am cursed with a strata of most inconvenient honesty, and I don’t. If I listed it as Secrets of the Sewers of London in 103 penny nos. at say £2-10-0, they would think it another “Todd” or “Varney” and about half a dozen would wire the money. But list it with the first title of “A Wife’s Tragedy” at say 17/6, and everybody gives it the bird.
I must admit the average Lloyd title is repellant. Will those who want the red meat of Highwayman and Pirate lore, deign to notice “Adeline, or the Grave of the Forsaken”? Certainly not. Or even “Pedlar’s Acre, or the Wife of Seven Husbands,” yet this latter is a “blood of bloods” and to my mind leaves “Todd” miles behind. “The Seven Husbands” certainly does suggest gruesome possibilities, which is borne out, as this angelic lady kills all her husbands while asleep by emptying a ladle of molten lead into their ear, and the description of their death throes, and their final awful shrieks, would have un-nerved “Todd” himself. Yet list it as “Pedlar’s Acre” and who wants it?
Then we have “The Blighted Heart,” “The Bridal Ring,” “Love and Mystery,” “The Lady in Black,” “Black Mantle,” “The Old House of West Street,” and about 200 more of Lloyd’s, not one with a selling title. Yet they bristle with pictures of pirates waving black flags, and the skull and cross bones emblazoned on their chests in real diamonds, masked highwaymen, secret passages, murders, abductions, etc. Yet those in search of the gruesome pass them by, because it is the “Angelina” or “Belinda” title that does it.
Leaving Lloyd we come to Malcolm J. Errym, with “Edith the Captive, or the Robbers of Epping Forest” in 104 nos. Certainly the secondary title does suggest a few naughty gentlemen might appear in it, but who would suppose it was another version of “Jack Sheppard and Jonathan Wild?” The sequel in 104 nos. is “Edith Heron, or the Earl and the Countess” which is even worse.
Then we have “Dora the Duchess, or Lover’s Trials.” A mystery of the highway which is just simply and purely a highwayman tale. Then “Rankley Grange” and “The Marquis of Daleswood” dished up by Edward Viles from old Lloyd stuff, and claimed as his own.
I know I groan when I get a fine lot of real old stuff, with terrible pirates, highwaymen, body snatchers, and gentle ladies boiling their husband’s heads for a pastime, and find they are all called “The Broken Heart” or “The Wife’s Dream.” Give me certainly good honest “Dick Turpin or Jack Rann,” but what is a poor vendor of penny bloods like myself to do when Dick and Jack are hidden behind the petticoats of some innocent little maiden of the village?
Confound the camouflaged “penny blood.” Give me the good old honest “Demon Barber,” or “Varney” and his “Feast of Blood” for after all, it is the “bill matter” that does it not the book.
BARRY ONO
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SCARCE” DREADFULS” IN THE BARRY ONO COLLECTION.
4th. LIST.
(Continued from No. 6.)
“Edith the Captive, or; the Robbers of Epping Forest,” 104 numbers. J. Dicks, 1861.
“Edith Heron” (sequel to “Edith the Captive,”) 104 nos. J. Dicks, 1863.
“The Felon’s Daughter, or; Pamela’s Perils,” 23 nos. J. Dicks, 1864.
“George Barrington, the Pickpocket.” 22 nos. J. Dicks, 1865.
“Little John and Will Scarlett, or; the Outlaws of Sherwood Forest,” 40 nos. H. Vickers, 1860.
“Jack Sheppard, his real life and Exploits,” 18 nos. Chas. Fox, 1886.
“Jack Sheppard, or; London in the Last Century,” 15 nos. G. Mansell, 1847.
“Jack Sheppard, the Housebreaker,” 20 nos. F. Glover, 1840.
“Jack Sheppard” (Unparalleled Exploits of) 12 nos. Thos. White, 1842.
“Jack Sheppard” (Surprising Adventures of) 30 nos. Jas. Caton, 1843.
“Jack Sheppard” (Life and Adventures of) 27 nos. G. Purkess, 1847.
“Jack Sheppard” (History of) nos. vague, 480 pages. J. Williams, 1840.
“Jack Sheppard” (Adventures of) nos. vague, 526 pages. J. Cochrane, 1845.
“Dashing Duval, the Ladies’ Highwayman,” 18 nos. Sully & Ford, 1891.
“Moll Cutpurse, the Lady Pickpocket,” 18 nos. W. Strange, 1846.
“Under the Blood Red Flag,” 12 nos. Best for Boys Co., 1891.
“The Double Man,” (another “Gentleman Jack the Highwayman,”) 14 nos. J. Loft, 1856.
“The Ghost’s Secret, a tale of Terror,” 9 nos. E. Harrison, 1863.
“Mazeppa, or; the Dwarf’s Revenge,” 12 nos. Newsagents’ Publishing Co., 1866.
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“Old Bartholomew Fair, an Historical Romance,” 12 nos. H. Lea, 1860.
“The Sailor Crusoe,” (Percy B. St. John) 25 nos. London Herald Office, 1871.
“The Arctic Crusoe,” (Percy B. St. John) 18 nos. Chas. Clarke, 1868.
“Green as Grass, a Jolly School Story,” 14 nos. Chas. Fox, 1887.
“Boys of Canem Academy,” 12 nos. E. Head, 1873.
“Tom Truant, his Adventures as Schoolboy, Soldier, Sailor, Actor,” 20 nos. R. Hearnden, 1864.
“Ned Kelly, the Iron Clad Australian Bushranger,” 38 nos. J. Isaacs, 1881.
(To be continued)
None of the above are for sale, only inserted to interest readers of “The Collector’s Miscellany.”
MORE LIGHT ON BRACEBRIDGE HEMYNG
(AUTHOR OF “JACK HARKAWAY,” ETC.)
I HAVE just become acquainted with the following news concerning this favourite author. Whilst in the U.S.A. he lived on Staten Island, then a separate part of New York City, now a part of Greater New York City. He lived in regal state.
His wife, when he came over to the U.S.A. at the instigation of Frank Leslie, (who by the way was an Englishman) became a deep thorn at his side. She would go into flights of fitful tempers and throw at Hemyng whatever came to her hand. She often hit the servants and poor Hemyng with all kinds of implements. Strange to say Hemyng with all the fineness of a real peaceful and submissive soul, bore it all.
One day in February she ran out of the house and was found the next day in a very bad condition, she died a few weeks later due to the exposure. He lived on in Staten Island until 1881, when he returned to England, but never returned to the U.S.A. While in England he began to practice law, remarried and wrote many serials for magazines, periodicals, etc., and was very contented. He died the week preceding September 23, 1901, in London. It is estimated that he wrote about a hundred serials, tales, romances, etc., one of which was entitled “Dick Lightheart among the Redskins,” a sequel to Brett’s Scapegrace series.
FRANK JAY
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THE LURE OF OLD “BLOODS”
I HAVE perused with enjoyment the notes by Blood Brothers Ono and Jay, and like everything they write, their contributions were full of meat. At first I was inclined to wholly agree with friend Jay’s prophecy that in a few years such literature would be quite forgotten. We all feel (rather mournfully) that as we die off gradually, “a new generation arises which knows not Joseph!” Items over which I drool and drivel create not one responsive throb in the bosoms of my children.
Nevertheless, the old “bloods,” representing as they do a phase in the history of periodical literature, are almost sure to eventually carry a value as objects of antiquarian interest. Another attribute which they possess is their sheer piracy. Space will not allow me to enumerate the glaring cases with which I am familiar, but I think Lloyd’s “Hebrew Maiden” would take a lot of beating as a travesty of Walter Scott. The number of Dickens piracies published by Lloyd are well known, and this should hold out some allure for a Dickens collector; even an ordinary Lloyd item would be, in a sense worth adding to the bag. I gave a lecture once to the Dickens Fellowship on this point and the audience seemed to sit it out with remarkable fortitude, and were, I believe, really interested. In many of my broadcast talks I have enunciated the same view. Personally I have never been much concerned with the value of these old books. I managed to preserve a number which had solaced my soul as a boy in the eighties and nineties, and have picked up a few that had strayed from the fold. Then, imbued with desire to possess the original of such favourites as I owned in book form, I began to gather up the old periodicals wherein they had first appeared. Price or condition gave me little worry and I was amazed when I learned how these old journals had risen in value.
As I am not an all-round collector, I must speak guardedly or Brother Barry will start to shake his gory locks at me. My most prized possessions (made up after much patching and restoring) are the first 20 vols. of the Boys of England and the last 26. This leaves, of course, a gap of 20 which I neither expect nor desire to fill. Hundreds of others besides are piled on my shelves and I still get a lot of fun out of them. Incidentally I also manage to amuse my unseen audience with excerpts from these old tomes whenever I am “on the air.”
Another point in favour of the survival of these old warriors is their crudeness and inaccuracy. Like that Cyclopaedia of Old London, Comrade Steele, I read my “bloods” and am able to speak with some degree of authority. And when I note in the “Black Monk” that bayonets and Jesuits were quite common during the Crusades my soul surges with thankfulness. Whenever I feel that Fate has handed me out a particularly painful uppercut I take out “The Lady in Black” and peruse the following lines:—
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“The man on the housetop bites his nether lip till the blood falls drop by drop on the heads of those below!”
No! so long as there are students inclined to puzzle over the mentality of the ancient readers who thrilled at such statements the lure of the old “Penny Dreadful” will survive!
J. P. QUAINE
Correspondents are requested to verify all dates, names, places etc. The Editor cannot be responsible, for any inaccuracies which may occur.
OLD BOYS’ BOOKS AND COMRADESHIP
DEAR SIR,
May I say I have been a collector, in a small way, of old boys’ journals for about 30 years. At that time, and for some years later, one could purchase quite a number of the old favourites for little more than published price. At that period the collection of these old periodicals was really a hobby, the acquiring of something one desired to have for itself, and not for its monetary value. Nowadays values in £ s.d. appears to be the dominant factor. In the old days the number of persons interested in the hobby was very small. I was in touch with a small band of fellow-enthusiasts, and we bought and sold, or exchanged, without financial gain, or if at any time there was any margin it was infinitesimal. Such was my early experiences. Personal friendships were made which exist to this day. We were, and are, interested in the old journals for their interest to us, not for what we can make out of the game financially.
Unfortunately for us, a little later, a few gentlemen evidently saw the possibilities as a trading venture, hence the fancy prices which have existed for many years.
My collection is only a very modest one, as collections go, consisting of a few volumes each of Ching-Ching’s Own, Boys’ World, Boys of the Empire, Young Men of Gt. Britain, and other journals and oddments, including all the Ching-Ching series of tales, but I venture to state that I get as much real enjoyment from them as does any of the “big noises” in
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the collecting field. It is certain that we have not all got the money to plunge with that some gentlemen in the “game” evidently have, and nowadays have to be satisfied with the journals we already possess, or such crumbs that fall from the “rich man’s table.”
I feel sure that in writing this, I am voicing the opinion of my several old fellow enthusiasts.
We old collectors, who were out to help each other to obtain what each other wanted, formed in several instances real fellowship and friendship. This more than compensates for the fact that we not having a surplus of wealth, cannot compete with those who boast of the huge prices they have had to pay for their collections.
When all is said, one cannot expect to make real friendships when the governing motive is to get the best of the deal with the individuals we come in contact with, when following a so-called hobby.
Wishing your little paper continued success.
ALKRINGTON.
F. W. PULESTON
FROM AN OLD SUBSCRIBER
DEAR SIR,
I sincerely hope Mr. Frank Jay is not going to sever his connection altogether with old boys journals, for his articles were always interesting, I read them as far back as 1918-19, in your magazine Vanity Fair, and also in Mr. Ben Winskill’s Rosemary. I still have several in my possession, including the one with the verses on “Old Bloods” written jointly by Frank Jay and Fred Harrison (Barry Ono) which finished up with:—
“If clean, complete, and bound up nice,
Just drop a line and ask the price,
That either these cranks will give,
Below their names, and where they live.”
With best wishes for the success of the Collector’s Miscellany.
DOWLAIS.
ARGET HARRIS
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WE are all collectors now-a-days, and judging from your columns, some queer articles are sought after and treasured. Match-box labels, razor blade packets and the like seem to have a fascination for some people. Well, everybody to his taste. I must frankly confess that cigar bands leave me cold, but to collect them is surely a harmless pursuit, and if anybody Gets a “kick” out of doing so, I wish him good luck.
But, what is usually termed the Juvenile Drama, is another matter altogether. For me the Juvenile Drama also includes Theatrical Portraits, and I am sure anybody who does not know the absorbing interest in collecting these old prints, that they are missing something indeed.
Before we go any further it would be just as well to clearly understand what the Juvenile Drama really is. Now there are at the moment two well known authorities on the subject of the Juvenile Drama and Theatrical Portraits.
But unfortunately like a good many experts on other matters, these two Gentlemen do not come to the same conclusion. Wild horses will not induce me to detail where they differ. Both of these gentlemen are valued friends of mine, and I have no intention of setting up as an authority on the subject in the face of so eminent a pair of experts.
While experts disagree however, it may be permissionable for a novice in all humility, to air his own views.
Firstly then, are these old prints to be considered as intended for children to play with, or are they—at all events some of them—something in the nature of the Play Pictorials of the past, in other words, souvenirs of a visit to the theatres of a bygone age? Personally I think both these views are correct. Again, who was the original inventor of the Juvenile Drama? Here also, difference of opinion exists.
Let us examine the facts as far as we can. Theatrical Portraits appear
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to have first been published about 1811, and sheets of characters and scenes of what may be called the Juvenile Drama appeared at the same date. It has I believe been claimed that sheets were published earlier than 1811, but no one seems to know anything about them. West was undoubtedly one of the earliest publishers, if not the earliest, and I have several fine portraits of his dated 1811 and also a few sheets of the characters of the same year. These sheets of characters appear to me to be portraits of the various actors and actresses who performed the plays actually produced at the Adelphi, Olympic and other theatres. These early sheets are really beautifully drawn, and it is a well known fact that many of them were the work of famous artists of the past. It may therefore be claimed that these prints are not children’s toys at all but mementos of a memorable visit to the theatre to see some famous actor in a famous impersonation. West published more than 100 plays.
Burtenshaw was another famous publisher who produced some splendid prints. The earliest of his in my possession is 1812.
Green was another early publisher, but I do not consider his sheets reached the standard of West or Hodgson, another splendid producer of these prints, both Portraits and also the Juvenile Drama.
Spread over a period of about fifty years there were more than fifty publishers in existence, and although many of these took over the plates of former publishers, a very large number of plays must have been issued in addition to thousands of portraits.
Space will not permit further details of the individual publisher’s plays, but I can assure you an article full of interest could easily be written about famous publishers such as West, Hodgson, Skelt and Parks.
Anyone who reads these lines may be tempted to start collecting and may well ask how and where these old prints are to be acquired. I cannot tell them. All I can say is that I have collected several thousands of Portraits and sheets of Juvenile Drama over a period of years.
Occasionally one is lucky enough to come across a few examples at some old printsellers in London and the larger provincial cities. Auction sales may bring a parcel of the old sheets to light. Energy and perseverance will certainly be wanted in the search, but to the true collector, difficulties only add zest to the quest.
I often look over my collection and recall how and when I acquired a particular sheet, and many happy hours can be spent in arranging and sorting the various plays. I can assure any reader of these lines that collecting Juvenile Drama is a most fascinating pastime.
M. W. STONE
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Wanted For Sale Exchange
IF YOU COLLECT American first editions, newspapers, magazines, California items, sheet music, songsters, theatre playbills, American ‘bloods,’ autographs, prints, subscribe for—THE COLLECTOR’S JOURNAL published quarterly, 6s. per year; single copies 2s. “An excellent publication” JOSEPH PARKS. Send orders to the publisher, James Madison, 465 South Detroit St, Los Angeles, Cal., U.S.A.
Wanted. Newnes (3d) Dick Turpin, Nos. 1, 2, 3, 5, 19 & 20, Newnes (2d) Black Bess Library (small series) No. 16. Aldine Robin Hood (2d) Nos. 37 and 38, 6d offered. All old Aldine Libraries, Boys Friend Library, (A.P.C.) Robin Hood Library, Henderson’s Rob Roy, Marvel, Pluck, Penny Poplars etc. Parks, Printer, Saltburn-by-Sea, Yorks, England.
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Wanted For Sale Exchange
Wanted: Bravos of Alsatia, The Wandering Apprentices, Karl the Uhlan, boys periodicals 1880-1900. Hunter, North Lodge, Sweethope, Musselburgh.
Wanted: by
Barry Ono, complete collections of “bloods” and fierce old boys journals. Report also single items. Top price for right stuff or good exchanges
offered. Want vol. 1 Tyburn Dick, vol. 9
Boys Comic. Offer 20/- for first 18 nos
Spring Heeled Jack. Collectors always
welcome to inspect my collection. Correspondence
invited.
For Sale: 200
volumes Hogarth House Library, Comrades, 3 vols. Boys Own Volume, Boys Own
Magazine, 8 vols, Every Boys Annuals, Kingston’s Magazine for Boys, early vols.
Boys Own Paper. Carter,
Wanted British
Bloods and Penny Dreadfuls, in volumes or runs, also old songsters, sheet
music, broadsides, playbills, etc. James
Madison, 465, So.
Wanted. Boys
Papers 1850 - 1916 Boys Standard, Boys
Comic, Sweeny Todd, Ching Ching, and hundreds of others. Report all titles. To be Published by Subscription E. Harcourt
Burrage’s own life story author of Ching Ching, Lambs of Littlecote etc. etc.—Write
for particulars, Simpson,