Single Letter

HAM/1/4/2/22

Letter from Frederick Hamilton to John Dickenson

Diplomatic Text


My dear Sir

      No words can expreʃs my gratitude to you & Mrs. Dickenson for your
unwearied attention to my dearest daughter; on a former occasion when
she was visited with a similar affliction in Bath, her perilous state ap=
peard
to me so very evident that I lost all command over my grief, but
alas! her present case is still much more desperate not having at this moment
a ray of hope. Nothing but the dread of meeting her cruel husband pre=
vents
my setting out immediately for London but if the unfortunate suffe=
rer
shoud even be alive at my arrival, I coud not answer it to myself to
disturb her last moments. shoud she be capable of receiving comfort
from her Fathers bleʃsing when you see her after having received this
letter, convey it I beseech you in the most impreʃsive terms You poʃeʃs your
self a most excellent daughter & thereforefore you can duely estimate my
feelings at this perilous crisis. My head is too confused to dwell longer
upon this painful subject. At a further period I hope I shall not be
wanting in every possible demonstration of my affection. With my
kindest remembrance to Mrs. & Miʃs Dickenson I remain Dear Sir
                                                         Your faithful & much obliged
                                                         humble Servant
                                                                   Frederick Hamilton
Bath May 23d. 1810.[1]



      John Dickenson Esqr.[2]
No 49. Welbeck Street
                             London


May 23 -- 1810[3]

[4]

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


Notes


 1. This dateline appears to the left of the closing salutation.
 2. Postmarks 'E 24MY24 1810' split above and below address when unfolded (indicating that the letter went through the post on 24 May 1810), and 'BATH' above address.
 3. This date appears to the right of the address, written vertically. The postmark makes clear that this cannot be the date of receipt.
 4. Remains of a seal, in red wax.

Normalised Text


My dear Sir

      No words can express my gratitude to you & Mrs. Dickenson for your
unwearied attention to my dearest daughter; on a former occasion when
she was visited with a similar affliction in Bath, her perilous state appeared
to me so very evident that I lost all command over my grief, but
alas! her present case is still much more desperate not having at this moment
a ray of hope. Nothing but the dread of meeting her cruel husband prevents
my setting out immediately for London but if the unfortunate sufferer
should even be alive at my arrival, I could not answer it to myself to
disturb her last moments. should she be capable of receiving comfort
from her Fathers blessing when you see her after having received this
letter, convey it I beseech you in the most impressive terms You posess your
self a most excellent daughter & therefore you can duly estimate my
feelings at this perilous crisis. My head is too confused to dwell longer
upon this painful subject. At a further period I hope I shall not be
wanting in every possible demonstration of my affection. With my
kindest remembrance to Mrs. & Miss Dickenson I remain Dear Sir
                                                         Your faithful & much obliged
                                                         humble Servant
                                                                   Frederick Hamilton
Bath May 23d. 1810.



      John Dickenson Esqr.
No 49. Welbeck Street
                             London



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



 1. This dateline appears to the left of the closing salutation.
 2. Postmarks 'E 24MY24 1810' split above and below address when unfolded (indicating that the letter went through the post on 24 May 1810), and 'BATH' above address.
 3. This date appears to the right of the address, written vertically. The postmark makes clear that this cannot be the date of receipt.
 4. Remains of a seal, in red wax.

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/1/4/2/22

Correspondence Details

Sender: Frederick Hamilton

Place sent: Bath

Addressee: John Dickenson

Place received: London

Date sent: 24 May 1810

Letter Description

Summary: Letter from Rev. Frederick Hamilton to John Dickenson. The letter relates to the grave illness of Mrs Holman who is not expected to live much longer. She is now in London and it is only the thought of meeting her 'cruel' husband that prevents him going to her straight away, 'but if the unfortunate sufferer shou[l]d even be alive at my arrival, I cou[l]d not answer it to myself to disturb her last moments'.
    Dated at Bath.
   

Length: 1 sheet, 226 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: Jennifer Fitton, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted December 2013)

Transliterator: Hannah Phillips, 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

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