Unlocking the Mary Hamilton papers

Single Letter

GEO/ADD/3/83/45

Letter from Mary Hamilton to George, Prince of Wales

Diplomatic Text


My

Mrs.
Sincerity is my Idol may it
ever be yours[1] -- If our friendship
is to continue I make but one
claim -- I exact ye. most strait
sincerity & undeviating sincerity
from you -- tis ye. only condition
I make with you, deceive me
not in the most trifling instance
& you can not deserve any
reproach from me, however
I may as a tender & affectionate
Sister & true friend venture
to reprove what I think wrong

[2]
Of what consequence can be
separation where persons never
do or can meet but under restraint
might not our friendship continue
just in its present state though
at the distance of some miles.
-- there is no occasion for me to
bind myself to any tie of
remaining

One thing more & I have done
you can gain neither glory -- honor
credit, nor satisfaction of any
long duration by establishing
a friendship with a person of
my Sex

Let not your present partiality
to me make you overlook &c

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


Notes


 1. Compare the emphasis on sincerity in the opening and closing words of GEO/ADD/3/83/2 of 24 June.
 2. Although this sheet is undated, the second page at least, whether or not it belongs with the first page, is evidently part of a draft response to a letter of the Prince's, for example GEO/ADD/3/82/18. The date can be no later than 1 August, as the Prince's GEO/ADD/3/82/20 in turn builds on the present text as follows: ‘Honor, credit or satisfaction of any long duration I can not gain by establishing an intimacy or friendſhip with any person of yr. Sex, but with such a one as yourself’. He also responds there to her rhetorical question about separation.

Normalised Text


My


Sincerity is my Idol may it
ever be yours -- If our friendship
is to continue I make but one
claim -- I exact the most strait
& undeviating sincerity
from you -- tis the only condition
I make with you, deceive me
not in the most trifling instance
& you can not deserve any
reproach from me, however
I may as a tender & affectionate
Sister & true friend venture
to reprove what I think wrong


Of what consequence can be
separation where persons never
do or can meet but under restraint
might not our friendship continue
just in its present state though
at the distance of some miles.
-- there is no occasion for me to
bind myself to any tie of
remaining

One thing more & I have done
you can gain neither glory -- honour
credit, nor satisfaction of any
long duration by establishing
a friendship with a person of
my Sex

Let not your present partiality
to me make you overlook &c

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



 1. Compare the emphasis on sincerity in the opening and closing words of GEO/ADD/3/83/2 of 24 June.
 2. Although this sheet is undated, the second page at least, whether or not it belongs with the first page, is evidently part of a draft response to a letter of the Prince's, for example GEO/ADD/3/82/18. The date can be no later than 1 August, as the Prince's GEO/ADD/3/82/20 in turn builds on the present text as follows: ‘Honor, credit or satisfaction of any long duration I can not gain by establishing an intimacy or friendſhip with any person of yr. Sex, but with such a one as yourself’. He also responds there to her rhetorical question about separation.

Metadata

Library References

Repository: Windsor Castle, The Royal Archives

Archive: GEO/ADD/3 Additional papers of George IV, as Prince, Regent, and King

Item title: Letter from Mary Hamilton to George, Prince of Wales

Shelfmark: GEO/ADD/3/83/45

Correspondence Details

Sender: Mary Hamilton

Place sent: unknown

Addressee: George, Prince of Wales (later George IV)

Place received: unknown

Date sent: not after 31 July 1779
notAfter 1 August 1779 (precision: medium)

Letter Description

Summary: Letter from Mary Hamilton to George, Prince of Wales, on sincerity being essential for the continuation of their friendship; and on a separation.
    Hamilton states 'of what consequence can be separation where persons never do or can meet but under restraint...'.
    [It is unclear if the text on both sides of the page belong to the same draft].
    [Drafts].
   

Length: 1 sheet, 163 words

Transliteration Information

Editorial declaration: First edited 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: Transcription and XML version created as part of project 'Unlocking the Mary Hamilton Papers', funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council under grant AH/S007121/1.

Transliterator: Tino Oudesluijs, editorial team (completed February 2020)

Copyright: Transcriptions, notes and TEI/XML © the editors

Revision date: 10 December 2021

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