Diplomatic Text
My dear Sir
I have just now receiv'd the favor of yours of the 22d. Inst.
& highly approve your judicious management in all respects
in a very troublesome busineʃs. I wish to do credit to my
dear daughter's memory, by which I understand that all
her debts may be faithfully discharged, as she explained
herself most explicitly to good Mrs. Mann Mrs. Mann & to
Doctor Whalley. I refer you to the former & will agree to
everything she may desire you to do on my account. Mrs.
Holman's dying requests transmitted to me through Dr.
Whalley, Mrs. Mann was not privy to, tho' I perceive they
were made in consequence of arrangements made with
my daughter, all these I hold most sacred & shall be strict
ly complied with; they were dictated in perfect equity,
since they referrd to money absolutely her own, & of which I
I had made her a free gift. I regret that I dared not en=
courage Mrs. Mann's visit to me as I am desirous beyond
measure to have a meeting with her, I have invariably appro=
ed of her conduct, mark'd with generosity & unwearied affection
to my late dear daughter, who conceal'd nothing from her.
When I opened my busineʃs with Mr. Holman who has been
with me two days, I premised, that there was one point neceʃsary
without which I cou'd not proceed, the acknowledgement of
his having receiv'd £4000 in part of the portion I proposed
to give my daughter, having aʃsented to this, I have paid
him £2111.1115 in balance of £6000 her portion which depen=
ded solely upon my verbal agreement with him, as I wou'd
never sign any contract. I have got his general discharge in
full of all demands whatever. As Mr. H had reason to expect a
different conduct, I believe he was agreeably surprised, but still
he had the aʃsurance to appeal to my aʃsurancegenerosity in a most ab=
surd harangue; that his marriage had been the cause of his
present deplorable situation, urging me to entitle him to
receive £2000 settled on my daughter & which he had receivd
You may believe I gave this impudent proposal an absolute
negative. On his taking leave, he desird permiʃsion to
write to me, to which I gave him this short answer, Sir you have
now an opportunity of communicating the object of your letter in
person, which is a mode preferable to writing, propose your
busineʃ, he then beat over the old ground by an appeal to my ge=
nerosity, & that as I retain'd the Annuity I might let him partake
of it; this put an abrupt conclusion to our conference & I am hap=
py in the thought all connexion between us is now totally at
an end; for shou'd he attempt to force a correspondence he will
receive no answer to his letters, which I am certain wou'd be [re=]
plete with impertinence & fallacy With my best com[pts.][ to]
Mrs. & Miʃs Dickenson I remain
My dear Sir
Your faithful & obliged humble Servt.
Frederick Hamilton
No. 1 Brock St. Bath.
June 24th. 1810.[1]
[3]
Mr. H.[4]
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)
Notes
1. This dateline appears to the left of the closing salutation and signature.
2. Postmarks 'E 25JU25 1810' (indicating that the letter went through the post on 25 June 1810) and 'BATH' above address when unfolded.
3. Remains of a seal, in black wax.
4. This annotation appears in the right margin of the page.
Normalised Text
My dear Sir
I have just now received the favour of yours of the 22d. Instant
& highly approve your judicious management in all respects
in a very troublesome business. I wish to do credit to my
dear daughter's memory, by which I understand that all
her debts may be faithfully discharged, as she explained
herself most explicitly to good Mrs. Mann & to
Doctor Whalley. I refer you to the former & will agree to
everything she may desire you to do on my account. Mrs.
Holman's dying requests transmitted to me through Dr.
Whalley, Mrs. Mann was not privy to, though I perceive they
were made in consequence of arrangements made with
my daughter, all these I hold most sacred & shall be strictly
complied with; they were dictated in perfect equity,
since they referred to money absolutely her own, & of which I
had made her a free gift. I regret that I dared not encourage
Mrs. Mann's visit to me as I am desirous beyond
measure to have a meeting with her, I have invariably approved
of her conduct, marked with generosity & unwearied affection
to my late dear daughter, who concealed nothing from her.
When I opened my business with Mr. Holman who has been
with me two days, I premised, that there was one point necessary
without which I could not proceed, the acknowledgement of
his having received £4000 in part of the portion I proposed
to give my daughter, having assented to this, I have paid
him £2111.15 in balance of £6000 her portion which depended
solely upon my verbal agreement with him, as I would
never sign any contract. I have got his general discharge in
full of all demands whatever. As Mr. Holman had reason to expect a
different conduct, I believe he was agreeably surprised, but still
he had the assurance to appeal to my generosity in a most absurd
harangue; that his marriage had been the cause of his
present deplorable situation, urging me to entitle him to
receive £2000 settled on my daughter & which he had received
You may believe I gave this impudent proposal an absolute
negative. On his taking leave, he desired permission to
write to me, to which I gave him this short answer, Sir you have
now an opportunity of communicating the object of your letter in
person, which is a mode preferable to writing, propose your
business, he then beat over the old ground by an appeal to my generosity
, & that as I retained the Annuity I might let him partake
of it; this put an abrupt conclusion to our conference & I am happy
in the thought all connexion between us is now totally at
an end; for should he attempt to force a correspondence he will
receive no answer to his letters, which I am certain would be replete
with impertinence & fallacy With my best compliments to
Mrs. & Miss Dickenson I remain
My dear Sir
Your faithful & obliged humble Servant
Frederick Hamilton
No. 1 Brock Street Bath.
June 24th. 1810.
No. 49 Welbeck Street
London
quotations, spellings, uncorrected forms, split words, abbreviations, formatting)
Notes
Metadata
Library References
Repository: John Rylands Research Institute and Library, University of Manchester
Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers
Item title: Letter from Frederick Hamilton to John Dickenson
Shelfmark: HAM/1/4/2/29
Correspondence Details
Sender: Frederick Hamilton
Place sent: Bath
Addressee: John Dickenson
Place received: London
Date sent: 25 June 1810
Letter Description
Summary: Letter from Rev. Frederick Hamilton to John Dickenson. The letter relates to financial issues resulting from the death of Mrs Holman, including her own wishes and discussions with Mr Holman. Frederick Hamilton refused to talk to Mr Holman on finance without his first acknowledging receiving '£4000 in part of the portion I proposed to give my daughter'. Hamilton paid him £2111 further, the 'balance of £6000 her portion which depended solely upon my verbal agreement with him', as he would never sign a contract with Holman. This figure represents the full figure that he can expect, and Frederick believes that his own conduct was so unexpected to Mr Holman that he was surprised, but he still hoped for a further settlement. Frederick refused, and Mr Holman asked if he could write to him, and again Frederick refused, stating that he could communicate any proposal there and then. Happily, 'all connexion between us is now totally at an end'.
Dated at Bath.
Length: 1 sheet, 522 words
Transliteration Information
Editorial declaration: First edited in the project 'Image to Text' (David Denison & Nuria Yáñez-Bouza, 2013-2019), now incorporated in the project 'Unlocking the Mary Hamilton Papers' (Hannah Barker, Sophie Coulombeau, David Denison, Tino Oudesluijs, Cassandra Ulph, Christine Wallis & Nuria Yáñez-Bouza, 2019-2023).
All quotation marks are retained in the text and are represented by appropriate Unicode characters. Words split across two lines may have a hyphen on the first, the second or both fragments (reco-|ver, imperfect|-ly, satisfacti-|-on); or a double hyphen (pur=|port, dan|=ger, qua=|=litys); or none (respect|ing). Any point in abbreviations with superscripted letter(s) is placed last, regardless of relative left-right orientation in the original. Thus, Mrs. or Mrs may occur, but M.rs or Mr.s do not.
Acknowledgements: XML version: Research Assistant funding in 2013/14 provided by G.L. Brook bequest, University of Manchester.
Research assistant: George Bailey, undergraduate student, University of Manchester
Transliterator: Katy Lorimer, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted December 2013)
Transliterator: Daniel Whiteley, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted December 2013)
Transliterator: Thomas Ingham, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted December 2013)
Cataloguer: Lisa Crawley, Archivist, The John Rylands Library
Cataloguer: John Hodgson, Head of Special Collections, John Rylands Research Institute and Library
Copyright: Transcriptions, notes and TEI/XML © the editors
Revision date: 2 November 2021