NEW YORK, N.Y.- Sotheby’s announces that its New York auction of Important Americana on 20 & 21 January 2012 will feature a previously undocumented high chest of drawers by renowned cabinetmaker John Townsend, which represents one of the most important discoveries of American furniture to come to light in decades. Signed and dated in 1756 when Townsend was 23 years old, The Exceptional Lieutenant Colonel Oliver Arnold Shell-Carved and Figured Mahogany High Chest of Drawers with Open Talons stands as his earliest surviving high chest, as well as one of the two earliest known works by his hand (est. $2/3 million*). The chest was originally owned by Lieutenant Colonel Oliver Arnold (1725-1789) and Mary Oliver Arnold (1725-1762) of East Greenwich, Rhode Island, who commissioned it on the occasion of their marriage in 1756. It has survived in their family for 255 years, having descended through six generations of fem