Thursday, 4:30 PM
Manchester-by-the-Sea library may have found a treasure, not in the attic, but in a crawl space
(Hirschl & Adler Galleries photo, Manchester-by-the-Sea Public Library photo)
The sculpture "America Honoring Her Fallen Brave" being offered by a New York gallery side by side with the sculpture found in the crawl space at the Manchester-by-the-Sea library.
By Martin Finucane, Globe Staff
A valuable piece of Civil War-era sculpture may have been found in a crawl space underneath the reading room at the public library in Manchester-by-the-Sea.
The white marble sculpture, titled "America Honoring Her Fallen Brave," could be worth as much as $200,000 according to one expert.
"It’s not a bad find for a basement, is it? I wish I'd find something like that in my basement," said Eric Baumgartner, senior vice president at Hirschl & Adler Galleries in New York.
Baumgartner said he reviewed pictures sent to him by a reporter at the Gloucester Daily Times and was certain that the statue is a work by James Henry Haseltine.
Why so certain? Baumgartner knows exactly what the work looks like. His own gallery is offering an identical statue, which it had believed was unique, for $185,000.
Dorothy Sieradzki, the library director, said someone needs to get into the 3-foot-high crawl space and turn the bust over to see the inscription on the back and make a positive identification, but "it’s very heavy and we don't want to scratch it by rolling it over."
Sieradzki said the town would probably sell the bust if it's valuable, but until that day, she wants to find a place to display it.
"No matter what the details turn out to be, I think it’s a wonderful little piece of history and whatever happens in the end, it’s just a great thing to happen," she said.
