Single Letter

HAM/1/13/12

Letter from Eleanor Glover (née Lenton) to Mary Hamilton

Diplomatic Text



Sunning
October. 29th. 1782.[2]

My Dear Miranda

      I am infinitely Oblig'd to you,
for your kind attention to me upon this occasi-
-on
; & I admire your prudence in not comply-
-ing
with my request To apply to her Majesty & the Princeʃs's[3]; in your situation, I
think you are perfectly right, but I did
not know it, or you may be ʃure, I wou'd
not have made, that propersition to you,
I am very certain, from your great bene-
-volence
of heart, that you are bleʃs'd
with; You have Objects sufficient of
Your own to give too; therefore I do
insiʃt upon it, that you do not give
any thing to my distreʃsd family, I
make no doubt lest I shall get suffi-
-ciently
to answer my perpose; I
dont let them have the money, I lay it



out my Self, & send the things to them;
I have got two Children Cloath'd, & put
to School; I shall be oblig'd to you, to send
me the Names of those who are so
kind to give; I thought it was better
to open the subscription with one
Guinea, than to give more; for it
might prevent People giveing their
crowns & half Crowns: Amongst my
requaintance in Town I shall
make my application -- I most
sincerely wish it, for your own
sake, as well as for those that
are in distreʃs, that your purʃe
was equal to the greatneʃs of
your soul. -- But my Dear
Miranda comfort your Self, with
thinking of the Widows mite.[4] --



Your good Father desires I will
make his greatful returns of thanks,
for your kind attention to him, &
he his now very busy in Planting:
Mary is reading to her Father, that
great Poem in manuscript, & with
pleasure I can inform you She reads
exseeding well; & he not a little
pleas'd with her. --
I long to see you, but dare not,
indulge the thought: I hear'd you
have been ill, you say, you are well,
I hope you are so; The Clarkes
are coming to us soon; I wish I
cou'd have Nanny, without dumb
Bell; but I can not accomplish
that point. -- accept of our
warmest love, to our Dear Miranda
                                                         E Glover
Sister & Mary
desire their best compts.[5]



[6]
Miʃs Hamilton
at the Queens Lodge
      Windsor[7]

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


Notes


 1. This number appears just below in the middle of the dateline.
 2. The dateline appears to the right of the salutation.
 3. This addition is written upside down between the opening salutation and the start of the letter.
 4. A small amount of money donated by a poor widow; (hence) a small donation or contribution, especially that made by a poor person (with allusion to Mark 12:42-44) (OED s.v. widow's mite n. A1. [The genitive of widow n. + mite n. 2 (compare mite n. 2 1c and the discussion in the etymology of that entry.] Accessed 24-06-2020).
 5. This postscript appears to the left of the signature.
 6. The remains of a seal are above the address, in red wax.
 7. A '4' is written to the left of the word 'Windsor', indicating postage paid. The envelope furthermore bears the postmark '30 OC', alongside the word 'Staines', referring to present-day Staines-upon-Thames, a town near Sunninghill.

Normalised Text



Sunning
October 29th. 1782.

My Dear Miranda

      I am infinitely Obliged to you,
for your kind attention to me upon this occasion
; & I admire your prudence in not complying
with my request ; in your situation, I
think you are perfectly right, but I did
not know it, or you may be sure, I would
not have made, that proposition to you,
I am very certain, from your great benevolence
of heart, that you are blessed
with; You have Objects sufficient of
Your own to give too; therefore I do
insist upon it, that you do not give
any thing to my distressed family, I
make no doubt lest I shall get sufficiently
to answer my purpose; I
dont let them have the money, I lay it



out my Self, & send the things to them;
I have got two Children Clothed, & put
to School; I shall be obliged to you, to send
me the Names of those who are so
kind to give; I thought it was better
to open the subscription with one
Guinea, than to give more; for it
might prevent People giving their
crowns & half Crowns: Amongst my
reacquaintance in Town I shall
make my application -- I most
sincerely wish it, for your own
sake, as well as for those that
are in distress, that your purse
was equal to the greatness of
your soul. -- But my Dear
Miranda comfort your Self, with
thinking of the Widows mite. --



Your good Father desires I will
make his grateful returns of thanks,
for your kind attention to him, &
he is now very busy in Planting:
Mary is reading to her Father, that
great Poem in manuscript, & with
pleasure I can inform you She reads
exceeding well; & he not a little
pleased with her. --
I long to see you, but dare not,
indulge the thought: I heard you
have been ill, you say, you are well,
I hope you are so; The Clarkes
are coming to us soon; I wish I
could have Nanny, without dumb
Bell; but I can not accomplish
that point. -- accept of our
warmest love, to our Dear Miranda
                                                         Eleanor Glover
Sister & Mary
desire their best compliments




Miss Hamilton
at the Queens Lodge
      Windsor

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



 1. This number appears just below in the middle of the dateline.
 2. The dateline appears to the right of the salutation.
 3. This addition is written upside down between the opening salutation and the start of the letter.
 4. A small amount of money donated by a poor widow; (hence) a small donation or contribution, especially that made by a poor person (with allusion to Mark 12:42-44) (OED s.v. widow's mite n. A1. [The genitive of widow n. + mite n. 2 (compare mite n. 2 1c and the discussion in the etymology of that entry.] Accessed 24-06-2020).
 5. This postscript appears to the left of the signature.
 6. The remains of a seal are above the address, in red wax.
 7. A '4' is written to the left of the word 'Windsor', indicating postage paid. The envelope furthermore bears the postmark '30 OC', alongside the word 'Staines', referring to present-day Staines-upon-Thames, a town near Sunninghill.

Metadata

Library References

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

Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers

Item title: Letter from Eleanor Glover (née Lenton) to Mary Hamilton

Shelfmark: HAM/1/13/12

Correspondence Details

Sender: Eleanor Glover (née Lenton)

Place sent: Sunninghill

Addressee: Mary Hamilton

Place received: Windsor

Date sent: 29 October 1782

Letter Description

Summary: Letter from Mrs Eleanor Glover to Mary Hamilton, relating to charity work and organising a subscription. Glover notes that she admires her 'prudence in not complying' with her request [which according to a note added in an alternative hand was to apply to the Queen and the princesses]. Glover believes that Hamilton acted correctly in her situation but she did not know it at the time and would not have made the proposal if she had. She notes that Hamilton has a benevolent heart and Glover is certain that she has 'objects sufficient of your own to give too, therefore I do insist upon it, that you do not give any thing to the distressed family'. Glover has no doubt that she will be able to get sufficient but that she will not 'let them have the money'. She has already provided for the clothes of two children and some schooling. She asks Hamilton to send her the names of those people who wish to give. She thinks it better to open the subscription at one guinea that to give more as this may prevent people from giving and that she will make applications to her acquaintances in town.
    Glover continues her letter with news of family and with news of friends. Mary Glover is reading a poem in manuscript and the Clarkes (HAM/1/10) are coming to visit. Glover notes that she wishes 'I could have Nanny, without dumb Bell; [this is a reference to Isabella Clarke who was deaf!] but I can not accomplish that point'.
    Dated at Sunning Hill.
    Original reference No. 5.
   

Length: 1 sheet, 375 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 24 June 2020)

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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