T. E. Lawrence

Offizier, Archäologe, Geheimagent und Schriftsteller, 1888-1935

T. E. Lawrence wurde vor allem durch seine Beteiligung an dem von den Briten forcierten Aufstand der Araber gegen das Osmanische Reich während des Ersten Weltkrieges bekannt. Aufgrund seiner Orts- und Sprachkenntnisse wurde Lawrence als Verbindungsmann ausgewählt und an den Ort des Geschehens gesandt. Rasch avancierte er zu einer der Schlüsselfiguren des arabischen Unabhängigkeitskampfes, nicht zuletzt durch einen engen, von gegenseitigem Respekt getragenen Kontakt zu Faisal I., einem der Söhne des Emirs. Zu einem Klassiker wurde das bildmächtige Wüstenepos „Lawrence von Arabien“ von David Lean a. d. J. 1962, das die Legende „Lawrence von Arabien“ maßgeblich prägte.

Quelle: Wikipedia

Lawrence, T[homas] E[dward]

British explorer, intelligence officer, and writer (1888-1935). Autograph letter signed ("TE Shaw"). Southampton. 4 pp. 8vo. Double sheet. With autograph envelope.
3.500 € (83603)

To Albert Yarwood at his shipbuilding company in Northwich, Cheshire, chiefly referring to progress on H.M.S. Auxiliary Aquarius, "I've had letters from Singapore about the Aquarius, which seems to have been adopted as a Station Pet! If she does half what they ask of her, she will be a wonder ship. The only criticism so far is that she is a bit hot, in the engine room. So I suppose the poor old chief is still sweating! He'll qualify for a jockey in two or three years time"; also discussing at length a new way of creating a new floor of mahogany sawdust for his cottage, Clouds Hill, in Dorset, where Yarwood supplied materials.

jetzt kaufen

Lawrence, T[homas] E[dward]

British explorer, intelligence officer, and writer (1888-1935). Typed document signed ("T. E. Shaw A/C" and "Arnold Green"). No place. 05.09.1933. Folio (13 x 8 inches). 2 pp.
4.500 € (33832/BN29401)

Brake Horse Power Test Sheet for a 8/28 h.p. engine. The document dates from Aircraftsman Shaw's second spell with the Air Force. It is completed with technical data including water temperature‚ oil pressure‚ etc. Marked "Air Ministry Engine Under Trial"‚ it apparently relates to the testing of the marine engines of the type installed in powered dinghies used for ferrying air and ground crews to moored flying boats and for general coastal duties. An intriguing document from his later Air Force days, and a splendid document late in life, when Lawrence was working on speed boats and motors.

jetzt kaufen

Lawrence, T[homas] E[dward]

British explorer, intelligence officer, and writer (1888-1935). Autograph letter signed ("TE Shaw"). Clouds Hill, Dorset. 4to 1 p.
9.500 € (47164/BN31849)

To Mr. Richard: "Your request rather worries me. My writing has no literary pretension, but has attracted notice since people have told stories about my oddness, making me out a romantic person - and it is considered curious that such a one should wish to write. Your paper is meant, you say, to be rather good. If so, why strain after a contribution from the merely notorious? I think I must wait till I have bought your first number + judged it for myself [...]".

jetzt kaufen

Lawrence, T[homas] E[dward]

British explorer, intelligence officer, and writer (1888-1935). Autograph letter signed ("TE Shaw"). Southampton. 18.07.1934. 8vo. 2 pp. and 2 lines on bifolium.
28.000 € (47272/BN32099)

"Dear Lady Young I wonder if you (and His Ex.) are still there? Your letter to me sat at 2 Smith Square (Sir H. B. not knowing my whereabouts) till last night, when I called and collected it. I am sorry. Most of my addresses are like that. Would you be so good as to register / T. E. Shaw / Clouds Hill / Moreton / Dorset / as my likeliest spot, in future? It represents my cottage on the heath, which will be home after March when the RAF bring themselves, not reluctantly, to dispense with my help? I'm sorry not to have seen you.

I wanted, while you were yet in Nyasa-land, to beg of His Ex. The rectangular skin of a small (1 sq. yard) lion, for my hearth-rug. But Ronald Storrs whom I saw at Southampton about a month ago told me you had been promoted to his province, and that there were no lions. Ronald was physically a very sick man. Mentally he was fighting hard to keep brisk… too hard for his health, I fear. The wreck of an old companion is too near a sight for sorrow, even. I hope Africa suits, after your trial of Asia and Europe. My respects to the Governor! Tell him I saw the fraudulent Abdulla, the other day. Exactly as he was, body & mind. Now, that's the way. / Yours sincerely TE Shaw / A poor letter: but I picture you again in Africa, and my squib spluttering in the void". - Between 1916 to 1918, Abdullah I of Jordan worked with the British guerrilla leader T. E. Lawrence (with whom he had actually never jarred), and played a key role as architect and planner of the Great Arab Revolt against Ottoman rule, leading guerrilla raids on garrisons. From 1921 until his assassination in 1951, Abdullah ruled Jordan, first as Emir under a British Mandate from 1921 to 1946, then as King of an independent nation from 1946 onwards..

jetzt kaufen

Lawrence, T[homas] E[dward]

British explorer, intelligence officer, and writer (1888-1935). Autograph letter signed ("TE Shaw"). Plymouth. 10.06.1931. 4to. 1 p.
12.500 € (47593/BN32255)

To a Mr. Bain, apparently a bookseller: "I am unfortunate: I need one of my own rotten books - a Revolt in the Desert, any late edition. Can you find one cheap? Send me those Irish Memories, too, about which you sent me a chit ... and are there any of S. Sassoon's skits on Wolfe (Pinchbeck Lyre's) to be got? Any edition. I wanted two. There is also a book called 'Juan in America' which I must read. Nothing else, I hope [...]". - Traces of folds.

jetzt kaufen

Lawrence, T[homas] E[dward]

Archäologe, Geheimagent und Schriftsteller (1888-1935). Eigenh. Brief mit U. ("TEShaw"). O. O. 02.05.1930. 1½ SS. 4to.
6.500 € (82570/BN53741)

An den Politiker Ernest Thurtle über die eben erreichte Gesetzesänderung zur Abschaffung der Todesstrafe innerhalb der britischen Armee zur Ahndung von Vergehen wie Fahnenflucht oder Feigheit vor dem Feinde: "Then the Lords gave me a fright. Lord Allenby too, whom I like and admire. Surely if I had been in London, able to see him, he would at least have kept silence - if not supported you. Yet doesn't it make you surer you were right, to see all the General Staff opposing you? In the end you downed the Lords, as you had downed the Government.

I feel it is a blessed victory. The old state of law hurt me. It was such a damnable judgement upon our own flesh & blood [...] I haven't really said thank you for all you did: because I feel that it was only your duty really. People who care anything at all about their countries don't like to see them fouling themselves [...]". - Thurtles Anstrengungen zur Gesetzesreform begannen mit einem ersten Entwurf im Jahre 1924 vor dem Hintergrund von mehr als 300 britischen Soldaten, die während des Ersten Weltkriegs wegen dieses Gesetzes hingerichtet worden waren. - Mit wenigen winzigen Randeinrissen entlang der Faltlinien..

jetzt kaufen

verkauft

 
[Lawrence, T[homas] E[dward]

Autograph letter signed ("R.").
Autograph ist nicht mehr verfügbar

To his friend "Rabbit", the RAF serviceman Robert A. M. Guy, putting off a meeting the latter had suggested and announcing the arrival of his new luxury motorcycle: "Won't do: this is a hush-hush place, in a desert, with no houses or pubs near. You can't come here. - Brough arrived here yesterday. Isn't very fit yet, having only just been decarbonised. I garage him near the camp. I'm afraid you can't have him for Easter though. - I may have next Friday - or rather Friday week, the Friday after Easter, free. (48 hours ex-duty for inoculation). If fine I'll pop up to Farnborough + see you in dinner hour, arriving about 12.30. That do? If not I'll run up some Wednesday afternoon + call on the C.O. + wave a hand to you as I pass. Love and mashed / R." - In August 1922 Lawrence had enlisted in the RAF under the name of "Ross" (hence the initial). He soon took some of the younger recruits under his wing, lending them books and helping them financially. One of these, the short and fair Rob Guy, "beautiful like a Greek God" (in Lawrence's words) but stricken with a "vile" Birmingham accent, was popularly known as "Rabbit" in the force. Judging from Lawrence's correspondence after he left Farnborough and the RAF in 1922, the two must have been very close at some point: indeed, Lawrence said that Guy "embodie[d] the best of the Air Force ranks as I picture them". Yet by the end of 1923, Lawrence had largely withdrawn himself from Guy, writing that "we're very unmatched, + it took [...] the barrack-room communion to weld us comfortably together"; even in this letter penned in March he seems to be edging away cautiously. Lawrence was at the time going through training in the Tank Corps, where, in his continuing quest for anonymity, he was known as "T. E. Shaw". The Brough here mentioned is not in fact the one on which he was famously killed, now on display at the Imperial War Museum. Altogether, Lawrence owned no fewer than eight Brough Superior motorcycles, of which this one (nicknamed "George I" and bought for a princely £150) was the second. - The included three photographs show Lawrence on yet another Brough Superior SS100, this one nicknamed "George V" (license plate RK 4907). They were taken by his good friend Sergeant A. Pugh, in B Flight with Lawrence at Cranwell. One image shows pencil passmarks for reproduction and traces of mounting. Provenance: from the collection of T. E. Lawrence's biographer Jeremy Michael Wilson (b. 1944), with his ms. ownership on the reverse of each print.


Lawrence, T[homas] E[dward]

Autograph letter signed ("TE Shaw").
Autograph ist nicht mehr verfügbar

To Whitney H. Shepardson of New York, who had inquired as to how he might obtain a copy of the "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" when the book was finally published: "The Prophet has sent me on your letter, with instructions to deal with it: - and I'm puzzled. Really you know you are foolish to want a copy. It's a thirty guinea book, of which so many copies are being sold as will meet the printing bills (about 120 copies perhaps) with some off-prints of the unadorned text for the twenty or thirty fellows who shared the campaign with me. I can't give them 30-guinea presents: they can't buy 30-guinea books. So I want the subscribers to pay for my generosity in giving them free copies. The prime cost lies in the pictures (about 60, many in colour, at 10/- a print!) and the pictures are only an unjustifiable whim of mine. They have been done by British artists whom I liked, + who would work for me. Such a luxury book is for the idle rich. Mrs. Lamont is getting one. Huntingdon [!] + Pierpont Morgan aren't...! ... Do you feel justified in chucking away so much on an amateur production? The writing is pretentious, dull, hysterical, egotistical, + preternaturally long. No human being has ever been to the end of it [the 335,000 word ms.]. They return it, thumbed to about half way, with pretty speeches. So long as I hold it secret, the sight of it is a boast, so long it will be praised. Seriously, it isn't any earthly good. It costs as I have said, may be a year yet in printing, + is horrible in parts. Eleanor (beg her pardon, but that's her only possible name. The proper ones only indicate her wayward choice of parents etc.) would be sick over it. The thing will not be reprinted entire in my life-time: you suggest 'for a long time.' ... but the prospect isn't pleasing. There will be an American Edition, to secure copyright. Doubleday, probably. He has made a reasonable estimate. It would be printed at my expense, two copies for the Library of Congress, or whatever the show is, + eight for sale: + the sale price will be prohibitive, so that they will never sell, + the edition will never be exhausted, + no one may pirate! I suggest 10,000 dollars, but F.N.D. hasn't yet considered what is above-high-water-mark in U.S.A. Tell me, please, if you are knowing! If despite all faults (my most honest dissuasion puts people on sometimes!) you want a copy: then you'll have to send fifteen guineas, half price - E. will know the size of the extinct coin - to: Manager / Bank of Liverpool + Martins / 68 Lombard St. / London, E.C.3, payable to TE Lawrence, + 'Seven Pillars account'. Balance when you get the book. Let me strongly urge you not to. I have 90 subscribers, so there is no urgency - on the point of helping lame dogs! [...]". - When the book finally appeared in 1926, the cost of each copy to Lawrence was triple the selling price, and it was not until the fourth reprint of the 1927 abridgement "Revolt in the Desert" that his debts were paid off. As the included receipt shows, Shepardson was undeterred and duly transferred the £15. 15/- to Liverpool & Martins' (the last copy of the 1926 "Pillars" at auction commanded £30,000 at Sotheby's in 2009). - The U.S. businessman Whitney Hart Shepardson (1890-1966), educated at Colgate, Balliol (as a Rhodes Scholar), and Harvard, had served as aide to the State Department at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, where he may have met Lawrence. Between 1925 and 1927 he served as director on J. D. Rockefeller's General Education Board. A leading O.S.S. operative in WWII, he was the first London head of Secret Intelligence and remained with the organization soon to become the C.I.A. until 1946.