Single Letter

HAM/1/4/3/4

Letter from Jane Holman and Rachel Hamilton (née Daniel) to Mary Hamilton

Diplomatic Text

[1]

Teingmouth June 27th 1785./


My Dear Cousin./

      I have not written to you since I came here,
because there really was nothing for me to communicate,
worth troubling you with -- I now take up the Pen
with great pleasure, having so good an occasion for it
as to beg you to accept my best Wishes and Congratulations
upon your Marriage -- My Father is writing to you, but
I wou'd not commiʃsion him to remember me in the
kindest manner to you instead of writing myself, because,
altho' /as I said before/ I have nothing to communicate; I thought
/knowing your kind friendship for me,/ that you wou'd rather
I shou'd write./      We receiv'd Robert's Letter dated from
Clarges Street, and were very sorry to find by it that
your excellent Friend Mr: Glover, was gone to Bath on
account of his health. We were the more particularly sorry,



because we knew it must vex you very much -- We hope
however that he will benefit by his excursion to Bath --
I wrote about a Week ago to Miʃs Glover, and directed my
Letter to Sunning-Hill, I hope it has reach'd her./
I will now conclude as my Mother wishes to add a few
Lines to you, and beg you to believe me, my dear Cousin
                             yours affectionately./
                                                         J: Hamilton./
[2]
Altho' My Dear Mrs. Dickenson might justly think that all
our congratulations shoud have been expreʃsed by one only of a family
knowing how much your leisure must at present be engroʃsed upon
the happy occasion, yet I shoud not have felt comfortable
had I commiʃsioned any one to say for me how sincerely I par-
-take
in the general Satisfaction with your other friends;
and I do it in this way as a postscript to my Daughters letter
hoping you will answer it in kind, without troubling yourself
with a separate Sheet; upon the same principle, I will trust



to your supposing for me, that I feel every thing upon
the subject of your present and future happineʃs as if I
had detained you by the perusal of pages. I hope Mr. H.
has told you how delighted Robert was with your Attention
to Him. He was indeed as perfectly Sensible of it as one shoud
suppose from the goodneʃs of his Heart: But I fear you
will have a powerful Rival in Mr Dickenson with whom
he seems to be quite captivated, and gave us the whole history
of his Endeavors to Entertain and amuse him and how we[ll he]
succeeded. I beg My best Compliments to Mr Dickenson who[se]
acquaintance I shall now be doubly happy to improve
and remain My Dear Mrs. Dickenson, with the most regard,
your very faithful and obliged,
                                                         Humble- Servant
                                                         R Hamilton

Teingmouth 27th June 85.[3]




Mrs. Dickenson[4]
      Clarges Street
                             Piccadilly[5]


Miʃs Hamilton
      June 1785[6]


[7]

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


Notes


 1. This part of the letter is written by Jane Holman (née Hamilton) (c1767/8-1810), Mary Hamilton's cousin.
 2. This section is written by Mrs Rachel Hamilton (née Daniel), mother of Jane Holman (née Hamilton).
 3. The rest of p.2, col.2 has been cut and torn off.
 4. Largely illegible postmark above address.
 5. The address appears in middle of the page when unfolded.
 6. This annotation is written vertically in the right margin of the page.
 7. The letter is naturally ascribed to 'Miss Hamilton', the title by which Jane Holman would have been known between the marriage of her elder sister Elizabeth (1777) and her own (1798).

Normalised Text


Teingmouth June 27th 1785./


My Dear Cousin./

      I have not written to you since I came here,
because there really was nothing for me to communicate,
worth troubling you with -- I now take up the Pen
with great pleasure, having so good an occasion for it
as to beg you to accept my best Wishes and Congratulations
upon your Marriage -- My Father is writing to you, but
I would not commission him to remember me in the
kindest manner to you instead of writing myself, because,
although /as I said before/ I have nothing to communicate; I thought
/knowing your kind friendship for me,/ that you would rather
I should write./      We received Robert's Letter dated from
Clarges Street, and were very sorry to find by it that
your excellent Friend Mr: Glover, was gone to Bath on
account of his health. We were the more particularly sorry,



because we knew it must vex you very much -- We hope
however that he will benefit by his excursion to Bath --
I wrote about a Week ago to Miss Glover, and directed my
Letter to Sunning-Hill, I hope it has reached her./
I will now conclude as my Mother wishes to add a few
Lines to you, and beg you to believe me, my dear Cousin
                             yours affectionately./
                                                         Jane Hamilton./

Although My Dear Mrs. Dickenson might justly think that all
our congratulations should have been expressed by one only of a family
knowing how much your leisure must at present be engrossed upon
the happy occasion, yet I should not have felt comfortable
had I commissioned any one to say for me how sincerely I partake
in the general Satisfaction with your other friends;
and I do it in this way as a postscript to my Daughters letter
hoping you will answer it in kind, without troubling yourself
with a separate Sheet; upon the same principle, I will trust



to your supposing for me, that I feel every thing upon
the subject of your present and future happiness as if I
had detained you by the perusal of pages. I hope Mr. Hamilton
has told you how delighted Robert was with your Attention
to Him. He was indeed as perfectly Sensible of it as one should
suppose from the goodness of his Heart: But I fear you
will have a powerful Rival in Mr Dickenson with whom
he seems to be quite captivated, and gave us the whole history
of his Endeavours to Entertain and amuse him and how well he
succeeded. I beg My best Compliments to Mr Dickenson whose
acquaintance I shall now be doubly happy to improve
and remain My Dear Mrs. Dickenson, with the most regard,
your very faithful and obliged,
                                                         Humble- Servant
                                                         Rachel Hamilton

Teingmouth 27th June 1785.




Mrs. Dickenson
      Clarges Street
                             Piccadilly


Miss Hamilton
      June 1785


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



 1. This part of the letter is written by Jane Holman (née Hamilton) (c1767/8-1810), Mary Hamilton's cousin.
 2. This section is written by Mrs Rachel Hamilton (née Daniel), mother of Jane Holman (née Hamilton).
 3. The rest of p.2, col.2 has been cut and torn off.
 4. Largely illegible postmark above address.
 5. The address appears in middle of the page when unfolded.
 6. This annotation is written vertically in the right margin of the page.
 7. The letter is naturally ascribed to 'Miss Hamilton', the title by which Jane Holman would have been known between the marriage of her elder sister Elizabeth (1777) and her own (1798).

Metadata

Library References

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

Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers

Item title: Letter from Jane Holman and Rachel Hamilton (née Daniel) to Mary Hamilton

Shelfmark: HAM/1/4/3/4

Correspondence Details

Sender: Jane Holman (née Hamilton) and Rachel Hamilton (née Daniel)

Place sent: Teignmouth

Addressee: Mary Hamilton

Place received: London

Date sent: 27 June 1785

Letter Description

Summary: Letter from Jane Hamilton and Mrs Rachel Hamilton to Mary Hamilton. The first part of the letter is written by Jane Hamilton, who congratulates her on her marriage to John Dickenson and expresses concern about Richard Glover's health. The second part is written by Jane's mother, Mrs Rachel Hamilton [née Daniel, married Reverend Frederick Hamilton c.1757], who congratulates Hamilton on her marriage and also reports her son Robert's delight at the attentions received from Hamilton and John Dickenson.
    Dated at Teignmouth [Devon].
   

Length: 1 sheet, 470 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: Isabella Formisano, former MA student, University of Manchester

Transliterator: Rosie Pendrey, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted May 2016)

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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