Charity shop finds £11,500 Sherlock Holmes book

Staff at a charity bookshop found a rare first edition of a Sherlock Holmes novel which raised £11,520 at auction.

The 1890 first edition of The Sign of Four by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was a routine donation from a regular supporter of the Oxfam shop in Shrewsbury.

The team realised it could be valuable and sent it for a specialist assessment.

It was later consigned to Bonhams auctioneers where it was sold, with the money going to the charity.

The book has its original red binding with gilt lettering and includes a bookplate indicating it once belonged to James Burgess Boote, who was high sheriff of Radnorshire.

Tom Cotton, manager of the Oxfam shop, said: "The book was donated by a very generous, regular donor who had always been delighted to see his books valued highly."

"Initially, I could tell the book was special - it was an early Sherlock Holmes story," he added.

"However, when it comes to appraising antiquarian books, I do not have the power of deduction like Sherlock Holmes - I'm more of a Mrs Hudson!

"Determining the value was a real group effort. I had my own Baker Street Irregulars: my volunteers, the Oxfam book development team, my area manager and even a close friend of my area manager. To prevent the book falling into the Reichenbach Falls of an Oxfam backroom, I used their skills to uncover a rare find!

"We're absolutely thrilled that a generous donation from someone in our community has turned into £11,000 to support Oxfam's work."

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