Single Letter

HAM/1/2/44

Letter from John Dickenson to Mary Hamilton

Diplomatic Text


                                                         2
                                                         1813
                             Oakford 1 Sepr. 13

I set out at 9 from Wellington & got here at half past one and am shook
almost to a Jelly -- I have heard of Devonshire
Roads but could have no Conception of them
till I had seen & felt them -- it is impoʃsible
for any thing to be worse & so narrow that
it is sometimes difficult to make an Arrange-
ment
to let a single horse paʃs -- the side
[W]indows are obliged to be down to prevent the
Boughs from breaking them & in hot
weather it would be particularly pleasant as
they enter the Carriage on both sides -- just
now it is rather amusing, as you gather
Nuts without any trouble -- On one Occasion
I could not help smiling, I met a Lady on
Horseback with a Gentn. behind her & I could
without remarked the difficulty he had to know
what to do with his hands, as one without a
constant Restrainttraint must naturally fall in the



Fair Dame's Lap -- I merely write to let
you know that I have paʃsed 17 Miles of the
Devonshire X Country Roads in a Chaise and am
alive after it -- I find my hand shakes but that
will be remedied -- Mrs. P. recd. me wh- great Cordi
ality
-- James is out -- & Margt. is on her Way from
The Hays --      Adieu I shall write on
Friday, no Saturday -- Friday is no post
                             Most Affy
                                  Yrs. JD
At Wellington, which is a little neat Town & at the
Squirrel where I sojourned, I observed a Turnspit
They keep up the old Custom -- a very pretty Terrier
is the Officiator -- He seemed very ready to show
me his Abilities & is never out of the Way when his
Services are wanted & the old Lady of the House said
he likes it as well as catching Rats -- This is a
delightful day -- no Sun & very warm -- I have only seen
two bad crops of Wheat all the journey -- Barley is



the finest that has been known for a great length of
time --


[1]
                                                         Single
To
      Mrs. Dickenson
32      Devonshire Place
                             London

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


Notes


 1. Round duty mark in red ink, dated 3 September 1813. Distance mark ‘WELLINGTON 168’ in black ink. Charge mark in black manuscript denoting postage due.

Normalised Text


                                                        
                                                        
                             Oakford 1 September 1813

I set out at 9 from Wellington & got here at half past one and am shaken
almost to a Jelly -- I have heard of Devonshire
Roads but could have no Conception of them
till I had seen & felt them -- it is impossible
for any thing to be worse & so narrow that
it is sometimes difficult to make an Arrangement
to let a single horse pass -- the side
Windows are obliged to be down to prevent the
Boughs from breaking them & in hot
weather it would be particularly pleasant as
they enter the Carriage on both sides -- just
now it is rather amusing, as you gather
Nuts without any trouble -- On one Occasion
I could not help smiling, I met a Lady on
Horseback with a Gentleman behind her & I
remarked the difficulty he had to know
what to do with his hands, as one without a
constant Restraint must naturally fall in the



Fair Dame's Lap -- I merely write to let
you know that I have passed 17 Miles of the
Devonshire cross-country Roads in a Chaise and am
alive after it -- I find my hand shakes but that
will be remedied -- Mrs. Parkin received me with great Cordiality
-- James is out -- & Margaret is on her Way from
The Hays --      Adieu I shall write on
Friday, no Saturday -- Friday is no post
                             Most Affectionately
                                  Yours John Dickenson
At Wellington, which is a little neat Town & at the
Squirrel where I sojourned, I observed a Turnspit
They keep up the old Custom -- a very pretty Terrier
is the Officiator -- He seemed very ready to show
me his Abilities & is never out of the Way when his
Services are wanted & the old Lady of the House said
he likes it as well as catching Rats -- This is a
delightful day -- no Sun & very warm -- I have only seen
two bad crops of Wheat all the journey -- Barley is



the finest that has been known for a great length of
time --



                                                         Single
To
      Mrs. Dickenson
32      Devonshire Place
                             London

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



 1. Round duty mark in red ink, dated 3 September 1813. Distance mark ‘WELLINGTON 168’ in black ink. Charge mark in black manuscript denoting postage due.

Metadata

Library References

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

Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers

Item title: Letter from John Dickenson to Mary Hamilton

Shelfmark: HAM/1/2/44

Correspondence Details

Sender: John Dickenson

Place sent: Oakford

Addressee: Mary Hamilton

Place received: London

Date sent: 1 September 1813

Letter Description

Summary: Letter from John Dickenson to his wife Mary née Hamilton. He writes of his arrival in Oakford in Devonshire, via Tiverton.
    Original reference No. 2.
   

Length: 1 sheet, 350 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 2014/15 and 2015/16 provided by the Department of Linguistics and English Language, University of Manchester.

Research assistant: Donald Alasdair Morrison, undergraduate student, University of Manchester

Transliterator: Rebecca Tiffany, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted November 2014)

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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