Numbered 40/50, Childhood was knocked down to a member of the London trade for £28,000 (plus 15 per cent buyer’s premium).
The bronze was one of 1360 sell-out lots from the red brick pile sold to benefit the Bromley Trust, the chosen charity of the late Toby Bromley (1912-2003) who lived at Ashley Manor for 50 years.
The £1.17m contents were as eclectic as memories of the man himself: a breeder of prize cattle, a renowned wildfowler who made his home a conservation wilderness, a yachtsman who ‘ran away to sea’ at the age of 70 and a fisherman who caught the world record sea trout on a dry fly.
Dog days at Ashley Manor
Right: among the highlights of the three-day on-the-premises house sale conducted by Woolley & Wallis at Ashley Manor, near Stockbridge, Hampshire from May 18-20 was this 11 1/2in (29cm) high bronze cast of a winsome puppy by Dame Elizabeth Frink (1930-1993).
