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Letters From A South America Guano Expedition

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles Start Price:150.00 USD Estimated At:300.00 - 400.00 USD
Letters From A South America Guano Expedition
<Our item number 140074><B>Letters From A South America Guano Expedition.</B> Two autograph letters from James Koopman, a ship&#39;s doctor, to his daughter Nellie in Maine, total of 6 pp. One is written from the Lobos Islands &#40;off the north coast of Peru and famous for their guano&#41;, 1876, 2 May. He writes of various people around him: Capt. Randal, the Scots cook and his German wife, a Capt. Patton of Bath [Maine] with a partially-paralyzed wife, the ships Grandee and Southern Ocean, and a cat which &#34;hangs around me all the time like a child homesick…&#34; The second letter is from Callao &#40;Chile&#41;, 1876, June 26. He writes that &#34;the ship Stars of N. Yarmouth has foundered and all but one man was lost…There is three other Guano ships here in the same fix that I am and four in Valparaiso…every one refused to proceed…we could not get the ship home…&#34; Faint stain. One original stamped and postmarked &#40;at New York&#41; envelope. Guano is the feces of seabirds, bats, and seals. It was used as fertilizer and as a gunpowder ingredient due to its high levels of phosphorus and nitrogen and its lack of odor. <BR>Estimated Value &#36;300 - 400. <BR><BR>Our item number 140074<BR><IMAGES><P ALIGN="CENTER"><IMG SRC="http://www.goldbergcoins.net/liveauction/49jpegs/140074.jpg"> </P></IMAGES>