EDINBURGH.- Lyon & Turnbull are to sell the writing desk belonging to Sir Walter Scott in their Rare Books and Manuscripts Sale on the 10th September 2014. The desk, where Scott may have written the first portion of “Waverley”, was given to Scott’s steward William Laidlaw and is valued at £2-3,000.

It is one of a number of lots in the sale that were given to Laidlaw by Scott and his family. There is a locket given to Sir Walter Scott by his son Major Walter Scott and his wife Jane on their wedding day. The locket valued at £7-1000 contains intertwined hair and is engraved "To Sir Walter Scott from Walter & Jane Scott". After Sir Walter Scott’s death the locket was given, by his son, to Laidlaw. There is also a portrait of William Laidlaw in the sale which was painted by John Morrison between 1782-1853, it is valued at £ 4-500.

William Laidlaw met Sir Walter Scott in 1801 when Scott visited Laidlaw's farm at Blackhouse in Tweedside. Their friendship flourished and in 1817 Laidlaw accepted Scott's offer to become his steward, moving to Kaeside, a cottage on the Abbotsford estate. When Scott's financial difficulties arose, Laidlaw returned to Balckhouse, but returned to Abbotsford in 1830. Scott sorely missed Laidlaw's company describing his absence as "a most melancholy blank". During his last illness Laidlaw was in constant attendance, and after his death was presented by Walter and June Scott with the brooch they had given Sir Walter upon their own wedding day. This Laidlaw wore until his own death in 1845.

The Mahogany sloped writing contains items relating to William Laidlaw and the Abbotsford Estate; a letter regarding the loan of the desk to the Inverness Museum (1952), 28 returned cheques signed by William Laidlaw (1841-42), printed Memorial Inscription for Thomas Purdie, Wood-Forester at Abbotsford (1829), game duty certificate issued to Thomas Purdie, Abbotsford (1824), receipt to J.G. Lockhart for assessed taxes in Roxburghshire, (30 June 1826), a signed letter from Mrs J. Laidlaw to Miss Katherine Laidlaw (1841), a signed letter from W. Blackwood to James Ballantyne regarding the estates of Kailzie and Horsburgh (1841), 1826 medal of Walter Scott by Thomas Stothard, a letter gifting the desk and its contents by Kate Carruthers to Robert Ballantyne Carruthers (1915), and several items relating to Laidlaw's period at Balnagown.

The Georgian locket containing the intertwined hair was given by Major Walter and Jane Scott on their wedding day 3 February 1825 to the poet, engraved on verso "To Sir Walter Scott from Walter & Jane Scott". There is an with autographed letter from Walter Scott's son "To William Laidlaw our dear fathers valued and affectionate friend from his sincere friends Walter & Jane Scott with the request that the inclosed hair of our dear father be placed in the locket which has been so often worn by the deceased, Abbortsford, Sept. 28, 1832".