Auctioneers

A wistful and chatty letter from Charlotte Brontë to her editor William S Williams comes for sale in California on September 7.

A group of just over 20 lots of Jacobite drinking glasses from the 18th century featured in a sale of Scottish Works of Art and Whisky held in Edinburgh.

The salt-glazed portrait jug of Nelson by Doulton & Watts of Lambeth is considered the first character jug made by Doulton

This elegant Victorian clear glass claret jug of neoclassical design featured in the July 27 sale at Kinghams (25/18/15% buyer’s premium).

Included in Mellors & Kirk’s (24% buyer’s premium) July 18-20 sale in Nottingham was this classic baluster goblet dated to the 18th century.

The artist Richard Ernst Eurich (1903-92) is rather hard to categorise.

An 18th century wine bottle honouring Thomas Wedgwood, a key figure in the history of the Wedgwood factory, comes for sale in Derbyshire this autumn.

What’s best to do with unsold lots… offer them again at half the price guide perhaps?

Bottles with fatal content had to be specially designed and coloured to avoid a nasty accident

Testing the market for still-lifes by Bloomsbury school favourite Duncan Grant (1885-1978), a painting by the artist emerged fresh from a notable source in Somerset.

The most eagerly contested lot in a recent sale at Potteries Auctions (25% buyer’s premium) was a Doulton stoneware Isobath inkwell.

Wedgwood has long been such a popular collecting strand in the US that it is no surprise to see quantities reappear on the market at auction, either as mixed-owner consignments or single-owner collections

Coastal scene formerly owned by collector in the diamond mining industry attracts considerable interest

This faded red-brown velvet cap worn by Alfred St George Hamersley (1848-1929) is believed to be the earliest rugby international cap to come to auction.

The boar’s head tureen with matching stand is considered the rarest of all the game tureens made by the Minton factory in its colourful majolica range.

Estimated at £300-500, a group of five hand-coloured prints of early 19th century Canada sold for £8500 at Gorringe’s (25% buyer’s premium) in Lewes.

Dated and inscribed and royal portrait subjects are the most desirable classes of early delftware

By their nature, rare bottles can emerge for sale in some unlikely places

An English covered goblet made in 1820 to commemorate the first voyage of the ship Woodford is on offer at Bishop & Miller in Glandford, Norfolk

A curious pearlware pottery hybrid animal with the head of a sheep and body of a winged fish proved a popular entry at Toovey’s (24.5% buyer’s premium).