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Beatles set to top Hitler at auction

Wellington - A signed copy of Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf will go under the hammer in New Zealand this month but auctioneers estimate it will fetch a pittance compared to items from The Beatles and Elton John.

The signatures are part of a collection amassed over 30 years by antiquarian book collector Des Schollum to be auctioned on November 24.

They include signed documents from figures as diverse as Mother Teresa, Queen Victoria and The Rolling Stones.

However, auction house Dunbar Sloane estimates the most valuable artefact is a handwritten note from New Zealand-born author Katherine Mansfield, a contemporary of Virginia Woolf and DH Lawrence, expected to fetch up to NZ$100 000.

Auctioneer Anthony Gallagher said Hitler's signature, scrawled on the flyleaf of the Nazi leader's manifesto in 1933, had relatively little value, with an estimated asking price of NZ$1 000 to NZ$2 000 dollars.

"Hitler signed anything that was put in from of him," Gallagher told the New Zealand Herald newspaper.

In contrast, a photograph signed by all four Beatles after an Auckland show has been valued at around NZ$15 000 and a platinum copy of Elton John's Goodbye Yellow Brick Road should fetch NZ$8 000.

The entire collection of almost 200 items is expected to raise up to NZ$200 000.


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