Single Letter

HAM/1/19/3

Letter from Mary Anne Napier to Mary Hamilton

Diplomatic Text


Mrs- Napier      X

Boston Octr: 19th 1768


      Nothing but want of ability to write should so long
have prevented my thanking my Dear Miʃs Hamilton for her
obligeing Letter -- I'm happy with the good Accounts you give Us
of yr Pappa & Mamma's Health & Congratulate them upon
haveing conquer'd their Gout & Rhumatism -- as for Colds I
dont fear much from them & hope both Mrs Hamilton & You
have lost the remembrance of haveing had them beffore You
can Receive this. We are very Sorry the Venison never
came to hand; proveably[1] the Keeper had heard the Regt: had
left Northampton -- & so did not Kill the Buck: but we
have heard no more about it Ourselves. I'm glad Mr
Samuel
is so very Indifferent about our Return as
it wont give him Uneasineʃs to know that the Troops are
order'd to remain in Lincolnshire all Winter & that the
Horses are brought from Graʃs to the different Quarters here --
I must therefore beg either yr Pappa or Mamma to acquaint
Mr Samuell that we return no more to Northampton -- Mr
Napier
would have wrote so to him -- but I write this from
his bed Side to which he is confined by a feverish Indis=
:position
-- so beg they'll give him this Information -- he sayd
at parting he'd paint the Parlour for his own Conveniency
whether we came back or not & did not mean going back
to the House till the end of this Month whether we came
or Not so he is still in time to do it sooner than we could
have been there had the Regt. return'd. Asure yourselves we
regreate much being so far remov'd from you -- & shall ever
retain the most Gratefull Sense of yr Polite & friendly
attention to Us while with You -- of this fact asure yr



Pappa
& Mamma as well as yourself -- as to any thing else I had
no partiality for Northampton nor do I Sigh after Babylonish
Acquaintance -- Intimacy I never should have formed there but
with Yourselves: much do I wish we had been near each other
Selfish enough you'll Say when I tell you I shall want the
comfort of Agreeable friends to Nurse me when confined & to
keep up my Spiritts till that time -- as I lie in; in febry or
March -- I'm now out of all Danger from my dangerous fall, but
Suffer greatly both from Situation & Uneasineʃs of Mind -- Harriot
& Mary are both confined to their room mostly to bed by the
fever & Ague Mainie has had a touch of it but we hope
she'll get it off easily -- we hope Mr Napier's wont last either
I've heard twice from Ruʃsia where our friends were Well &
much pleas'd with their Situation & Reception -- Lady Cathcart
seems in high Spiritts asure yr Pappa wt ever became of
the Letter I know my Br wrote one to him beffore he left
London because he wrote to me he had done so, to bid him
Adieu & to thank him & all of you for yr goodneʃs to Us
wch we had mention'd to him in the terms we thought it deservd
Pray is Mrs Frederick Hamilton brought to bed yet & wt has
she got?[2] its yet uncertain whether Head Quarters may not be
fixt at Lincoln for the Winter -- if so we go there -- if not we
continue where we are -- Boston affords all proper Aʃsistance
for my Situation -- I hope soon to hear good Acts from you wt
a History of all Memorable transactions amongst You; all
our best respects attend Mr & Mrs Hamilton & Yourself yr
Cousins
as well as we are Heartily sorry its like to be so
long beffore we Meet: however we hope to have that pleasure
often in some other part of the World wherever we are
our best Wishes are Yours Adieu my Dear Madam -- bellieve
me Ever
      Your Sincearly Affectionate &c &c
                                                         M A Napier

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


Notes


 1. Mrs Napier generally (mis)uses the rare word provably with the intended sense of probably.
 2. This would be Frederick and Rachel Hamilton's second daughter, Jane, born in October 1768.

Normalised Text


     

Boston October 19th 1768


      Nothing but want of ability to write should so long
have prevented my thanking my Dear Miss Hamilton for her
obliging Letter -- I'm happy with the good Accounts you give Us
of your Pappa & Mamma's Health & Congratulate them upon
having conquered their Gout & Rheumatism -- as for Colds I
don't fear much from them & hope both Mrs Hamilton & You
have lost the remembrance of having had them before You
can Receive this. We are very Sorry the Venison never
came to hand; provably the Keeper had heard the Regiment had
left Northampton -- & so did not Kill the Buck: but we
have heard no more about it Ourselves. I'm glad Mr
Samuel is so very Indifferent about our Return as
it won't give him Uneasiness to know that the Troops are
ordered to remain in Lincolnshire all Winter & that the
Horses are brought from Grass to the different Quarters here --
I must therefore beg either your Pappa or Mamma to acquaint
Mr Samuel that we return no more to Northampton -- Mr
Napier would have written so to him -- but I write this from
his bed Side to which he is confined by a feverish Indisposition
-- so beg they'll give him this Information -- he said
at parting heed paint the Parlour for his own Conveniency
whether we came back or not & did not mean going back
to the House till the end of this Month whether we came
or Not so he is still in time to do it sooner than we could
have been there had the Regiment returned. Assure yourselves we
regret much being so far removed from you -- & shall ever
retain the most Grateful Sense of your Polite & friendly
attention to Us while with You -- of this fact assure your



Pappa & Mamma as well as yourself -- as to any thing else I had
no partiality for Northampton nor do I Sigh after Babylonish
Acquaintance -- Intimacy I never should have formed there but
with Yourselves: much do I wish we had been near each other
Selfish enough you'll Say when I tell you I shall want the
comfort of Agreeable friends to Nurse me when confined & to
keep up my Spirits till that time -- as I lie in; in february or
March -- I'm now out of all Danger from my dangerous fall, but
Suffer greatly both from Situation & Uneasiness of Mind -- Harriot
& Mary are both confined to their room mostly to bed by the
fever & Ague Mainie has had a touch of it but we hope
she'll get it off easily -- we hope Mr Napier's won't last either
I've heard twice from Russia where our friends were Well &
much pleased with their Situation & Reception -- Lady Cathcart
seems in high Spirits assure your Pappa what ever became of
the Letter I know my Brother wrote one to him before he left
London because he wrote to me he had done so, to bid him
Adieu & to thank him & all of you for your goodness to Us
which we had mentioned to him in the terms we thought it deserved
Pray is Mrs Frederick Hamilton brought to bed yet & what has
she got? it's yet uncertain whether Head Quarters may not be
fixed at Lincoln for the Winter -- if so we go there -- if not we
continue where we are -- Boston affords all proper Assistance
for my Situation -- I hope soon to hear good Accounts from you with
a History of all Memorable transactions amongst You; all
our best respects attend Mr & Mrs Hamilton & Yourself your
Cousins as well as we are Heartily sorry it's like to be so
long before we Meet: however we hope to have that pleasure
often in some other part of the World wherever we are
our best Wishes are Yours Adieu my Dear Madam -- believe
me Ever
      Your Sincerely Affectionate &c &c
                                                         Mary Anne Napier

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quotations,
spellings, uncorrected forms, split words, abbreviations, formatting)



 1. Mrs Napier generally (mis)uses the rare word provably with the intended sense of probably.
 2. This would be Frederick and Rachel Hamilton's second daughter, Jane, born in October 1768.

Metadata

Library References

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

Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers

Item title: Letter from Mary Anne Napier to Mary Hamilton

Shelfmark: HAM/1/19/3

Correspondence Details

Sender: Lady Mary Anne Napier (née Cathcart)

Place sent: Boston

Addressee: Mary Hamilton

Place received: Northampton (certainty: high)

Date sent: 19 October 1768

Letter Description

Summary: Letter from Mary Anne Napier [later Lady Napier] to Mary Hamilton. She regrets that they are so far separated from one another. She will 'want the comfort of Agreeable friends to Nurse me when confined & to keep up my Spirits till that time as I lie in', in February or March. She is now out of danger following her fall, but admits that she 'Suffer[s] greatly both from Situation & Uneasiness of Mind'. She has heard twice from Lady Cathcart in Russia, 'where our friends were Well & much pleas'd with their Situation & Reception' [her husband was ambassador in St Petersburg]. Napier is uncertain whether her husband's regiment will take up winter quarters in Lincoln or remain in Boston.
    Dated at Boston [Lincolnshire].
   

Length: 1 sheet, 664 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 2017/18 provided by the Department of Linguistics and English Language, University of Manchester.

Research assistant: Georgia Tutt, MA student, University of Manchester

Transliterator: Asim Ramzan, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted May 2018)

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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