OF

One of the great figures of world history. A 12 x 8 cm envelope, with the front panel addressed in Wellington's distinctive forward-sloping hand to 'M General / Henry Thomas'. Under this is a line wih three loops, and at bottom left the good clear signature 'Wellington'. The envelope is in fair condition, lightly aged and worn, and has been ripped open with military decisiveness. On the reverse is a government seal in red wax, of which the only clear impressions are the unicorn and a fragment of text at the head: '[...]R . IN . CHIEFS . OF [...]'.

1p, 4to. Rather aged, with some wear and discoloration at head and foot, and minor traces of mount on reverse. Four folds. Signed ‘Walter H. Page’ and addressed to ‘C. Reginald Grundy, Esq., / 1, Duke Street, / S. W. 1.’ The note reads: ‘Dear Sir: / I wish it had been possible for me to attend the meeting at the Mansion House to-day to further the establishment of local war museums, but I regret to say that it was impossible. / Yours very truly, / Walter H. Page’.

41 items from the papers of the railway economist C. E. R. Sherrington [Charles Ely Rose Sherrington] (1897-1973). Sherrington was the son of the Nobel-prize winning physiologist Sir Charles Scott Sherrington (1857-1952). Having served in France with the Oxfordshire Light Infantry and the Railway Transport Establishment of the British Expeditionary Force, Sherrington was lecturer in Economics and Transportation at Cornell University from 1922 to 1924. Returning to Britain, he was Secretary of the Railway Research Service from 1924 to 1962.

See Beckett’s entry in the History of Parliament, according to which he held the position of Under-Secretary of State for Home Affairs from 1806 to 1817. 1p, foolscap 8vo. In fair condition, lightly aged and creased at the foot, with strip of discoloration at the head. Folded twice into a packet. Addressed to ‘Colonel Torrens’.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 1p, 4to. In good condition, lightly aged, with several creases on folding into packet, one of which has a short closed tear to the edge. Minor traces of mount on reverse. Reads: ‘Lord Henry Petty will be obliged to Mr Gray, if he can make it convenient to call in Downing Street to-morrow at 2 oClock. / September 29th. 1806.’ Minuted by recipient on reverse: ‘29. Sept. 1806 / Lord Hy. Petty. / To be with His Ldp tomorrow. / 30th. went & recd. Instructions to work out the appointmt. of One Messenger to attend the Chancellor, whose allowce is to be 4s. P diem.’

Scarce: no copy on ViaLibri, OCLC WorldCat and JISC LHD. Stapled pamphlet. 7pp, 12mo. Unpaginated. In fair condition, lightly aged and worn, with light spotting and slightly rusted staples. Inscribed at head of cover: ‘With the author’s compliments / O. A. LeBeau’. Drophead title on third page: ‘HALLEY’S COMET. / BY O. A. LE BEAU, B.Sc. / [Mr. Le Beau is an O. B. of the Grammar School, whose Astronomical Notes in our columns some years ago many of our readers will no doubt remember. - ED.]’

Despite the fact that Reynolds and Crookes’s X-ray apparatus is now in the Science Museum at South Kensington, Reynolds has no entry in the Oxford DNB, although Crookes’s entry can be consulted. The two items are in good condition, lightly aged and worn. Both folded several times. Both 1p, 4to, and both signed ‘Russell J. Reynolds’. ONE: Addressed to G. K. Menzies of the Royal Society of Arts. With recipient's red pencil tick.

See image. A nice item, linking two important figures in French history. 1p, foolscap 8vo, on the recto of the first leaf of a bifolium of unwatermarked gilt-edged wove paper. Aged and lightly creased, with short closed tears and wear at the head. The ten lines of neatly written text are neatly and clearly signed ‘Louis’, and there is a wavy and almost vertical line from the king’s signature to that of ‘Chateaubriand’ at bottom right of the page.

See his entries in the Oxford DNB (where his edition of Pepys is described as ‘an amateurish travesty’ of the transcript) and the History of Parliament. 2pp, 12mo. In good condition, lightly aged and folded twice. Good neat signature: ‘Braybrooke’. The recipient is not named, but the name of the editor of the work mentioned by Braybrooke is given as 'C.

See the two men’s entries in the Oxford DNB. 3pp, 12mo. Bifolium. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded twice. Addressed to ‘Dear Mr Paxton’ and signed ‘Morpeth’. Much of the letter comprises a twenty-three line quotation from a letter Morpeth has received ‘from a great friend of mine in Dublin, Mr Hamilton’ (After the transcription of Hamilton’s letter Morpeth gives his name as ‘William Tighe Hamilton Esqre [1807-1886] / Donnybrook / Dublin’.

See image. It is hard to see how this collection could be bettered, the range of signatures from sanity to madness being of particular interest. All seven examples laid down on a folio leaf extracted from an album. The leaf is in poor condition, creased and with closed tears, but the parchment and paper bearing the signatures themselves in good condition, the six parchment items having the usual discoloration, but the example on paper in excellent condition.

Asee image of[339]See Williamson’s entry by his daughter-in-law Anne Williamson in the Oxford DNB, together with her 1995 biography of him. The present tranche of material gives a marvellous insight into the working processes of a fine - perhaps even a great - English writer, in addition to showing the gestation of one of the finest novels of the First World War.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB, in which ‘deep professional commitment and mental toughness’ are said to be qualities whose possession he demonstrated ‘heroically’. Beatty’s aggressive tactics at the Battle of Jutland are often contrasted with Jellicoe’s more cautious approach. After the explosion of the Indefatigable and the Queen Mary, with the loss of 1283 officers and men, he came out with the celebrated understatement, ‘There seems to be something wrong with our bloody ships today’.

An interesting item, casting light on Victorian London publishing of periodical literature. For Passmore Edwards, to whom London is indebted for innumerable public libraries (many now closed), see his entry in the Oxford DNB. ‘The Biographical Magazine’ was founded in 1852, and the first two volumes were published by ‘J. Passmore Edwards, 2, Horse-shoe Court, Ludgate Hill’.

The circumstances surrounding this extraordinary original composition in Latin verse are obscure. See Phillips’s entry in the Oxford DNB, which notes that there was ‘an air of Proust’ about him, and quotes Oliver Brown’s description of him as ‘a stout man, immaculately dressed and heavily scented, who talked continuously while he looked at the pictures'. It may be that Phillips and the author of the poem had been educated together, or that they were members of the same club (the Athenaeum for example).

See the two men’s entries in the Oxford DNB. Each item 1p, 12mo, on a bifolium. Both in fair condition, lightly aged, and both folded twice for postage. Both addressed to ‘My dear Crofton’. LETTER: Signed ‘S C H’. Presumably while working on ‘A Week at Killarney’, the book he and his wife published in London in 1843, Hall asks for ‘one or two morsels about the Palatines’ (see ‘Killarney’, pp. 78-79, a peculiar race of strangers): ‘Why were they planted in Ireland? - when precisely? by whom precisely’. NOTE. Signed ‘S. C. Hall’. ‘Godwin tells me the certificate is not “up” at the Antiquaries.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB and the History of Parliament (‘the foremost diplomat of his age’). It was Malmesbury who went to Brunswick to fetch the Prince Regent’s betrothed Princess Caroline, and whom he asked to get him a brandy on his first encounter with her three years before the present letter was written. A legible script was clearly not a prerequisite for a successful diplomat, as the handwriting of this missive is scandalously bad: practically on a level with that of Dr Parr. 1p, 4to.

An interesting letter, revealing the nuanced position of a liberal cleric on a difficult question. See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 4pp, 12mo. On bifolium. Signed ‘J. F. Oxon:’. Text clear and entire, on creased and worn paper, with two short closed tears at edges. Folded twice for postage. Minuted (by the recipient) at top of first page: ‘I read this at the Cler[ical]. meeting - (part of it)’.

See his entries in the Oxford DNB and History of Parliament. A loyal Pittite (‘publicity agent for the ministry’, and founder of the Tory ‘Sun’ newspaper) who served as Irish Secretary. As a connoisseur he had a strong influence on the taste of the Prince of Wales, besides recommending the purchase for the nation of the Elgin Marbles. He bequeathed fifteen paintings to the new National Gallery. 2pp, 12mo. Signed ‘Farnborough’. The circumstances of the present item are unknown. In good condition, lightly aged and worn. Folded twice.

Four surviving pages, lacking signature page, bifolium, first and last page dusted but text clear and complete. My dear Sir Sidney, | It is with sincere pleasure I [?] your safe & happy meeting with Lady Smith and her amiable daughters. I am [?] in the enjoyment of similar feelings sailing as fast as [?] Caledonia can go with a fair wind to embrace my own family among whom thank God I may now hope to live in happiness and [Dye?] in Peace, which neither you or I expected, when we last parted.

Hailing from Gateshead, County Durham, Elliot was a self-made man: he began life as a colliery labourer and ended it as one of the richest men in England, his wealth at death being given as £575,000. See his entry in the Oxford DNB. His residence in Whitby containing an Egyptian mummy was visited by Bram Stoker and appears to have inspired his 'Tale of the Seven Stars' (1903). 3pp, two of them 12mo and one 8vo. Bifolium, with one page of text written across the central opening at right angles. In good condition, lightly aged and worn, with a little glue from mount along outer gutter.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded twice for postage, and in envelope with stamp and Leeds postmark addressed in autograph to ‘Mrs. Stopford / Sussex Lodge / Horsham / Sussex’. Addressed to ‘Dear Mrs. Stopford’ and signed ‘J B. Baillie’. He begins in almost philosophical terms: ‘Dear Mrs. Stopford, / How very kind of you to remember this little request. It was such a pleasure to receive the cutting.

A scarce item: the only copy on COPAC at Trinity College Dublin. (WorldCat records a German library holding). See the entry on the Society’s founder, Rev. Alexander Dallas, in the Oxford DNB. The organisation, which still operates, is a controversial one. It was founded to convert Irish Roman Catholics to Protestantism, and the attitude of those involved can be gauged by the fact that its members considered the Potato Famine a judgement on the Catholics and made relief conditional on conversion, and that the Bishop of Tuam evicted tenants for not sending their children to Protestant schools.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. Both items 1p, 12mo, and both in good condition, lightly aged, with slight evidence of previous mounting on the blank reverses. Both folded once for postage. Both letters during the tenure as Lord Mayor of London of Sir John Charles Bell (1843-1924). ONE (8 March 1907): ‘Sir Claude Macdonald has the honour to accept the kind invitation of the Lord Mayor to Luncheon on March 13th.

Three scarce items, with no other copies traced. All three carry the Club’s badge. The 1929 menu is in good condition; the other two items are in fair condition, lightly aged and worn. The two ‘Christmas Supper’ menus are uniform in layout. Each is printed on an 8vo piece of white card, with the same photograph of ‘J. Windsor Burgess as Father Christmas’ on one side and the menu on the other. (The menus differ and are dated.) Each menu is wrapped in a grey-paper 8vo bifolium, printed on all four sides. The Menu for 19 December 1927 states on the cover: ‘J. H. Brocklehurst, Esq.

See the entries on Tonyn and Paterson in the Oxford DNB, the latter stating of the recipient of this letter: ‘On 28 December 1799 he married, at St Pancras chapel, London, Jane Ellen Yeats (1771/2–1846), daughter of David Yeats, formerly registrar of East Florida, and sister of his first cousin, the physician Grant David Yeats.’ Paterson’s mother was a Tonyn, and he was also related to the Marchmont family, the Earl having been his early patron. The present item is 3pp, 4to, and a bifolium.

See both men’s entries in the Oxford DNB. 1p, 12mo. With mourning border. In good condition, lightly aged. Addressed to ‘Revd Canon Richson’ and ‘Revd and Dear Sir’, and signed ‘J. P. Manchester.’ He thanks him for his pamphlet, stating that it will have his full attention, and praising Richson as ‘thoroughly conversant with education’. Being under the impression that Richson is ‘connected with the School of Art’, he is ‘sending the enclosed as I received it’.

The daughter of the fifth Duke of Argyll, Lady Charlotte bore eleven children to her two husbands, and was forced to write novels by her first husband’s death and second husband’s profligacy. See her entry in the Oxford DNB. 4pp, 16mo. Bifolium. In good condition, lightly aged. Neatly attached by a paper hinge to part of a leaf from an album. Begins: ‘Lady Charlotte Bury presents her Compts to Sir William Hamilton, & takes the liberty of soliciting for the honor & favor of his name, as a subscriber to a work by Lady Charlotte of which the enclosed Prospectus gives every particular.

See the entry for this ‘charismatic preacher and flamboyant individual’ (referred to several times in Kilvert’s diary) in the Oxford DNB, which states that, having been dispossessed out of his property and forced to dissolve his monastery in Norwich, in 1869 he was able, with the support of a wealthy benefactor, to purchase a property at Capel-y-ffin in the Black Mountains, south Wales, where he built Llanthony Abbey. 2pp, 12mo. On bifolium. In fair condition, lightly aged. Folded once for postage. The letter is headed ‘Jesus Only.’ It begins: ‘My dear daughter in Jesus.

See Richard A. Cosgrove’s laudatory entry on him in the Oxford DNB, as well as that on Henry Goudy (1848-1921), Regius Professor of Civil Law (like Dicey, of All Souls). The recipient, Archibald Arthur Prankerd (1851-1926), of Worcester College, was also in the law faculty at Oxford. 1p, 12mo. In good condition, lightly aged and creased. Folded once for postage. Signed and underlined at foot in pencil ‘A V Dicey’. The letter, in a secretarial hand, reads: ‘Dear Prankerd, / This Dissertation will I think suffice. Please look it through & send it back to Goudy.