Creighton woodut...well at least it used to be

[aquarius31]

There was a recent auction for a Leslie's Illustrated woodcut of James Creighton. It did not sell so I contacted the seller as he lives near me. Well I just went over there today to take a look at it and was perplexed/saddened by what I saw.

The woodcut has a divide in the middle which is to be expected as that's how it would have been presented in the full weekly publication. However, at some point the center was literally split in half (not sure if intended or accidental). The overall woodcut itself is not as wide due to this split and this is evident as one of the players at the bottom (Rogers) is completely missing along with the pitcher in the center woodcut. In place of the Creighton woodcut, someone superimposed another player. Unfortunately the seller was curious to see what was under the superimposed woodcut so decided to try to lift it off. In doing so, the woodcut was completely destroyed and underneath, Creighton was no where to be found other than portions of the shroud covering him!

Here are some before and after pictures. For what it's worth (which is not much now), I initially thought that the superimposed image was a boxer given the pose. However it does somewhat look like Roger Connor. I have never seen that particular woodcut and likely will never see it as it's completely destroyed now.

Before image 1
Before image 2
After

[drc]

That is really weird. I assume the 'overplayer' was added many years ago. Cutting and pasting and rearranging wasn't rare way back when.

[aquarius31]

Hi David, yes I believe that it would have been added around the same time frame or at least 19th century but woodcut was removed/destroyed so was unable to confirm.

[scooter729]

Sorry to hear, George. I know you were looking forward to having this work out in a positive way, so it's too bad to see it got ruined like that....

Scott