A rare collection of a wartime comic has sold at auction in Dundee for £15,600.
Magic comic was published on July 22 1939 and ran for only 80 issues until January 25 1941, when wartime paper rationing stopped DC Thomson from publishing further issues.
The collection at auction contained issues numbered one to 24 and were successfully snapped up by a phone bidder from Dubai.
They were expected to fetch between £2,000 and £5,000. The successful final bid was £13,000 but a £2,600 buyer’s premium was added.
Curr and Dewar hosted the auction and Steven Dewar said: “It was more than I personally expected it to make.
“There are a number of keen collectors and we had two very keen individuals.
“For us, this is not the marketplace we’re known for but with the power of the internet and word of mouth, the specialist marketplace that buys these items heard about it.
“We did an antiques roadshow and this item came up. When we started looking into it we realised the rarity and value attached to those items.
“It’s a Dundee comic, the seller is a Dundee resident and she felt keen to keep it local. She is happy to get that price for the item.
“There was a lot of interest in it. It is one of those collecting markets that just shows how rare that comic was and to have a whole run of numbers one-24 unbroken is a great draw and made all the difference to prospective buyers.”
The collection was sold by a woman who had been clearing out her late father’s possessions.
Characters in the collection include Peter Piper, who looks very like Oor Wullie, Koko the Pup and Sooty Snowball.
The auction house said there are thought to be only eight to 10 known copies of the first Magic Comic in existence.
In 2004 and 2005, number one issues were sold at auction for £1,331 and £1,925 respectively, while a number two issue sold for £558 in 2004.