Single Letter

HAM/1/14/34

Letter from Martha Carolina Goldsworthy to Mary Hamilton

Diplomatic Text


32

Queens Lodge Tuesday
     28 Decbr
     1779 --


My Dearest --

Tho I have nothing very lively to comunicate
yet my Vanity aʃsures me that a
few lines from your Friend will not
be unacceptable, & that you will
be pleased to hear that I am well
& happy, whether all the Company
is I will not venture to aver, for I
think I have seen masks of Ennui
in a Person or Persons who upon Paper
shall be nameleʃs. The Weather
certainly has not been propitious,
We have never walked, therefore except
ten Minutes at Breakfast I never see



my Gentlemen till 4 o' Clock I thenafter that
as usual I stay till I have drank Coffee
then leave them to attend the Princeʃs's
& return when the Q is so gracious
as to tell one I may go & drink
Tea, our three first Evgs after that
were spent in a Circle /for tho I tried
I could not destroy it/ round Mrs
Hagedorn
s Fire till past ten, last
Night we had Musick & a Commerce
Party which I liked, it consisted of
the Princeʃs's, Genl Budé Col Hotham
& my Brother, & very comfortable
we were, it is a great delight the
knowing he is in the House but you
see my Dearest by this dull Journal
how very little I really see of him,
it rains to day, therefore I hope



the Princes will be able to Hunt
once before they leave Windsor, last
Night they got Straits as that
was to have been this Morgs diversion
but useleʃs, & they are all gone
out to walk in Weather
that you & I would not
---ingly have sent our
[Foo]tmen, this my Drt
is a fruitful Narrative of our
Xm̄as Hollidays Amusement, tho
there is a comfortable circumstance
I have omitted viz that we do
not breakfast till pt nine, by wc̄h
means we avoid dreʃsing by Candle
Light -- Adieu my Dearest
                             Affectionately Yr.
                                       MC Goldsworthy




                             [1]
                             [2]
Miʃs Hamilton
      St James's[3]
[4]
                             [5]

(hover over blue text or annotations for clarification;
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)


Notes


 1. Remains of a red seal, in wax.
 2. Remains of a stamp, reading '29', indicating that the day this letter went through the post was 29 December 1779.
 3. A large '2' is written to the right of the address, likely indicating postage due.
 4. Postmark 'WINDSOR' below address panel when unfolded.
 5. Remains of a red seal, in wax.

Normalised Text



Queens Lodge Tuesday
     28 December
     1779 --


My Dearest --

Though I have nothing very lively to communicate
yet my Vanity assures me that a
few lines from your Friend will not
be unacceptable, & that you will
be pleased to hear that I am well
& happy, whether all the Company
is I will not venture to aver, for I
think I have seen masks of Ennui
in a Person or Persons who upon Paper
shall be nameless. The Weather
certainly has not been propitious,
We have never walked, therefore except
ten Minutes at Breakfast I never see



my Gentlemen till 4 o'Clock after that
as usual I stay till I have drunk Coffee
then leave them to attend the Princess's
& return when the Queen is so gracious
as to tell one I may go & drink
Tea, our three first Evenings after that
were spent in a Circle /for though I tried
I could not destroy it/ round Mrs
Hagedorns Fire till past ten, last
Night we had music & a Commerce
Party which I liked, it consisted of
the Princess's, General Budé Colonel Hotham
& my Brother, & very comfortable
we were, it is a great delight the
knowing he is in the House but you
see my Dearest by this dull Journal
how very little I really see of him,
it rains to day, therefore I hope



the Princes will be able to Hunt
once before they leave Windsor, last
Night they got Straits as that
was to have been this Mornings diversion
but useless, & they are all gone
out to walk in Weather
that you & I would not
---ingly have sent our
Footmen, this my Dearest
is a fruitful Narrative of our
Christmas Holidays Amusement, though
there is a comfortable circumstance
I have omitted viz that we do
not breakfast till past nine, by which
means we avoid dressing by Candle
Light -- Adieu my Dearest
                             Affectionately Yours
                                       Martha Carolina Goldsworthy




                            
                            
Miss Hamilton
      St James's

                            

(consult diplomatic text or XML for annotations, deletions, clarifications, persons,
quotations,
spellings, uncorrected forms, split words, abbreviations, formatting)



 1. Remains of a red seal, in wax.
 2. Remains of a stamp, reading '29', indicating that the day this letter went through the post was 29 December 1779.
 3. A large '2' is written to the right of the address, likely indicating postage due.
 4. Postmark 'WINDSOR' below address panel when unfolded.
 5. Remains of a red seal, in wax.

Metadata

Library References

Repository: John Rylands Research Institute and Library, University of Manchester

Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers

Item title: Letter from Martha Carolina Goldsworthy to Mary Hamilton

Shelfmark: HAM/1/14/34

Correspondence Details

Sender: Martha Carolina Goldsworthy

Place sent: Windsor

Addressee: Mary Hamilton

Place received: London

Date sent: 29 December 1779

Letter Description

Summary: Letter from Martha Carolina Goldsworthy to Mary Hamilton. She notes that she has little to communicate to Hamilton, but she is sure that she would still like a few lines from her friend. The letter continues with news of the Princesses and with how she spends her time.
    Dated at the Queen's Lodge.
    Original reference No. 32.
   

Length: 1 sheet, 330 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 2017/18 provided by the Department of Linguistics and English Language, University of Manchester.

Research assistant: Georgia Tutt, MA student, University of Manchester

Transliterator: Ellie Jarvis, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted May 2018)

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

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