Diplomatic Text
76
1788
It has been in Expectation of
getting a Conveyance to London, that I
have so long deferr'd my dear Friend to
thank you for the kind Concern you
Exprest for my Illneʃs. I have now the
Comfort of being able to tell you, that
I am, I thank God perfectly recovered
except that I have not entirely re
gained my Strength: but I am so sur
prizingly improved in this Respect, within
the last Week, that I trust I shall soon
be as well as I was before my Illneʃs.
As it has pleased God to restore me[1]
Life & to my Friends, may his Goodneʃs
enable me to make a proper Use of
the Bleʃsing! When I reflect on
What I felt, while I was at the worst, & indeed
from the weakness & pain, which succeeded
it, I feel with great Force, how contented
& thankful one ought to be, with only
slight & inconsiderable Interruptions of
general Health
By this time, I imagine
you are got to Richmond, & I hope are
enjoying in Health & good Spirits every
Delight which a beautiful Situation,
& the Society of Friendship can give you.
Mr Dickenson, to whom I beg to be kindly
remembered, I hope is quite free from his
tiresome bilious Complaint: & Louisa skip
-ping like a Lamb, among the Flowers
of the Field. & feeling very differently
from what she did when she was peep-
ing out a dusty window in great
George Street Hanover Square.
I had a letter lately
from Lady Wake, in which she gives a
comfortable Account of her self & her
Girls. I am rejoyced to find that
her Eyes are very tolerably
recovered. I am not easy
about dear Lady Cremorne: yet
I flatter my self from the last
Letter I had from her, that she
is upon the whole rather better.
It must be gradually, that she[2]
can get over such a Shock as
her Constitution has suffered
from her most distressing Tryals.
Adieu my dear Friend. I am
Your obliged & affectionate
ECarter
Deal June 30 1788
I fear as you gave your friends such a
Holiday in Town this Year we must not hope to
see you the next
Mrs. Carter June
30 1788
[3]
For
Mrs Dickenson[4]
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)
Notes
1. It is difficult to parse this sentence without inserting a missing to here.
2. Remains of a seal in red wax, and a hole where it has been broken. No text is lost.
3. Fragments of the words ‘the Society’ from p.2 are visible through a hole where the seal has been torn away.
4. The direction is written vertically.
Normalised Text
It has been in Expectation of
getting a Conveyance to London, that I
have so long deferred my dear Friend to
thank you for the kind Concern you
Expressed for my Illness. I have now the
Comfort of being able to tell you, that
I am, I thank God perfectly recovered
except that I have not entirely regained
my Strength: but I am so surprisingly
improved in this Respect, within
the last Week, that I trust I shall soon
be as well as I was before my Illness.
As it has pleased God to restore me
Life & to my Friends, may his Goodness
enable me to make a proper Use of
the Blessing! When I reflect on
What I felt, while I was at the worst, & indeed
from the weakness & pain, which succeeded
it, I feel with great Force, how contented
& thankful one ought to be, with only
slight & inconsiderable Interruptions of
general Health
By this time, I imagine
you are got to Richmond, & I hope are
enjoying in Health & good Spirits every
Delight which a beautiful Situation,
& the Society of Friendship can give you.
Mr Dickenson, to whom I beg to be kindly
remembered, I hope is quite free from his
tiresome bilious Complaint: & Louisa skipping
like a Lamb, among the Flowers
of the Field. & feeling very differently
from what she did when she was peeping
out a dusty window in great
George Street Hanover Square.
I had a letter lately
from Lady Wake, in which she gives a
comfortable Account of her self & her
Girls. I am rejoiced to find that
her Eyes are very tolerably
recovered. I am not easy
about dear Lady Cremorne: yet
I flatter my self from the last
Letter I had from her, that she
is upon the whole rather better.
It must be gradually, that she
can get over such a Shock as
her Constitution has suffered
from her most distressing Trials.
Adieu my dear Friend. I am
Your obliged & affectionate
Elizabeth Carter
Deal June 30 1788
I fear as you gave your friends such a
Holiday in Town this Year we must not hope to
see you the next
For
Mrs Dickenson
quotations, spellings, uncorrected forms, split words, abbreviations, formatting)
Notes
Metadata
Library References
Repository: Houghton Library Repository, Harvard University
Archive: Elizabeth Carter and Hannah More letters to Mary Hamilton
Item title: Letter from Elizabeth Carter to Mary Hamilton
Shelfmark: MS Eng 1778 76
Correspondence Details
Sender: Elizabeth Carter
Place sent: Deal
Addressee: Mary Hamilton
Place received: unknown
Date sent: 30 June 1788
Letter Description
Summary: Letter from Elizabeth Carter to Mary Hamilton, detailing a recovery from illness. Carter imagines Hamilton and family now enjoying the rural delights of Richmond. She has had a good report from Lady Wake and is hopeful of Lady Cremorne's continued gradual recovery. She fears that after Hamilton's prolonged stay in London that summer, her friends will not see her next year.
Original entry in Houghton Library catalogue: Carter, Elizabeth, 1717-1806. Autograph manuscript letter (signed) to Mary Hamilton; Deal, 1788 June 30.
Length: 2 sheets, 000 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: XML version first created without transcription as part of project 'Unlocking the Mary Hamilton Papers', funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council under grant AH/S007121/1. Transcription added after the funded period under the supervision of David Denison and Nuria Yáñez-Bouza.
Transliterator: Pete Morris, Artificial Intelligence and Ideas Adoption (AIIA), The University of Manchester Library (Plain text transliteration submitted 26 February 2026)
Cataloguer: Bonnie B. Salt, Archivist, Houghton Library
Copyright: Transcriptions, notes and TEI/XML © the editors
Revision date: 13 October 2026
