A MANUSCRIPT containing a mysterious reference to famous Leigh-born novelist James Hilton is to go on sale.

The papers and uncorrected proof of R.F. Delderfield's novel To Serve Them All My Days will be auctioned at Sotheby's in London on July 12 and is expected to fetch up to £3,000.

But experts are baffled by a warm and lengthy tribute included in the draft, from Delderfield to the Oscar-winning Hollywood screenwriter from Leigh.

Delderfield writes about the great debt his novel owed to Hilton's celebrated Goodbye Mr Chips. But for some unexplained reason Delderfield omitted all reference to Hilton in the published version of his novel.

Sotheby's book expert Dr Peter Beal said: "It really is a mystery why Delderfield took out all mention to James Hilton. Maybe he thought on reflection he wasn't that indebted to Hilton, maybe he thought he over did it. I suppose it's open to interpretation.

"It shows how thoughts can change after the first draft. I don't know how much interest there will be in the manuscript. To my knowledge we have not sold anything of Delderfield's before."

Ronald Frederick Delderfield (1912-72) also wrote Napoleon in Love (1959) and A Horseman Riding By (1966 - 68). To Serve Them All My Days was the last novel he saw in print in his own lifetime and it was televised by the BBC

The novel is about the return from World War One of the shell-shocked David Powlett Jones to a teaching post at Bamfylde school in a remote part of Devon and his subsequent years there before World War Two.

James Hilton was born in Leigh in 1900. His first novel Catherine Herself was published in 1920 and many of his successful novels such as Knight Without Armour (1933) and Goodbye Mr Chips (1934) were turned into films. He and three collegues won the Oscar for the Best Screenplay of1942 for Mrs Miniver which also won the Oscar for the Best Film of 1942. He died in 1954.