[GOLD RUSH] Decorative billhead for the Miner’s Store of John S. Cragg, Wholesale & Retail Ironmonger, 11 Swanston St. South, Melbourne. Dated 12 October 1854.

A$1,400 · Offered by Douglas Stewart Fine Books

Melbourne : R. Quarrill Co., Lithographers, 74 Collins St. West, [1854]. Lithographed billhead, 195 x 240 mm, with vignette view of the premises of John S. Cragg s Miner s Store at the Yarra end of Swanston Street; manuscript date of 12 October 1854, with entries recording the sale of a soup tureen and ladle for £1 10/- to the ship Shirley (an American merchant vessel), endorsed as paid by one of Cragg s employees; a very well preserved document. An attractive and very scarce ephemeral printing from Melbourne at the height of the gold rush. Reuben Quarrill (1828-1904) was active as a lithographer in Melbourne for only a short period, in 1853-4. He is best known for a series of lithographic views of Melbourne, Williamstown and Geelong, several of which at least were drawn by Edmund Thomas. Quarrill then worked as a commission agent and later turned to journalism, ending his career as the editor of the Geelong Advertiser . Ironmonger John S. Cragg s notice appeared in The Argus , 16 February 1854, advising the Melbourne public that he was moving his business, The Miner s Store, from 21 Swanston Street to new premises at 11 Swanston Street (four doors closer to Prince s Bridge). In the illustration on this billhead, the facade of his stone building has the address No. 11 from No. 21 below the name Miner s Store. The American ship Shirley , out of Salem, Massachusetts, was a merchant clipper of 910 tons owned by Stone, Silsbee Pickman. She arrived in Port Phillip on 1 October 185

• Binding: Hardcover

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