Lot after lot at the 220 lot auction was catalogued as the work of major old and modern masters.
They included Thomas Gainsborough, George Frederick Watts, James McNeil Whistler, Alberto Giacometti, Paul Gauguin, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Henri Toulouse Lautrec.
Most were unsigned, but many had been attributed by Norman to well-known artists either in the catalogues he produced for exhibitions, or on labels attached to the drawings.
The names were those one might find in a major British watercolour sale at Christie's and Sotheby's.
Yet the total was only £240,000 plus 17.5 per cent buyers premium.
This is close to the the price of one just one serious autographed work.
The sale came by way of the recnt discovery of a box of watercolours under a bed by the dealer's daughter Amanda in the family's Pimlico flat.
The works came to light after the death of Norman's his wife Margaret.
He maintained a gallery in the prestige art selling neighbourhood of London's St James' for many years while in Australia (first in Melbourne and later in Perth).
However, they attracted some criticism then, as they did in the latest sale.
Often calling on God to verify them, Norman always appeared to have in stock a small selection of drawings by major masters, particularly John Constable.
A feature before the auction of "the find" in the London Evening Standard may have been responsible for the big crowd, Barbara Dixon, an auction assistant at Chiswick Auctions, said.
Some other newspapers chimed in with reports of the "big find."
Buyers tended to pay over the estimates for the works hoping to make discoveries they could prove up further.
While Norman started selling his scraps and doodles in Australia, Christie's with its headquarters across the road from his gallery in London, had just opened an office in Australia which was shunting some of the finest watercolours through its London salerooms on behalf of the Dangar and other Australian landed families.
Some of the Christie's offerings, a serious loss to Australia, have turned upin recent years and sold for more than £500,000 each.
The best prices achieved at Chiswick were £8000 for a Renoir and £12,500 for a Kokoshka.
Colin Gleadell wrote a critical account of the Chiswick Auctions sale in the London Daily Telegraph on July 4.
Norman's Australian days were not mentioned.
He may have left behind some tantalising works on paper from the brief Australian sojourn.
Buyers who find them will be asking, as per Gleadell's latest headline:"were they buying the real thing?"
He quoted a number of sceptical experts in the watercolour trade.
"Write what you will," joked a spokesperson of the auctioneer:" But make sure spell our names right."
