LORD

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. Written lengthwise on back of 11.5 x 7.5 printed card. The side of the card with Roberts’s autograph is discoloured but in fair condition, but there is slight loss along the inner margin of the printed side, resulting in some loss of text. Roberts’ autograph reads: ‘I give my vote / Fred. Roberts. / India / 14th. April 1888.’ The printed text states that Caroline Constance Williams, aged 8 years, was the daughter of Band-Sergt.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 1p, 12mo. In very good condition. Folded twice. Clear and neat signature beneath slightly-smudged text. Written on the verge of his removal from the House of Commons to the House of Lords. Reads ‘[Admiral Buser?] to Gallery of H of C / Tuesday May 8th. 1866 / E B Lytton’. See image.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. An 11.5 x 7 cm piece of paper, cut from the front of an envelope. In fair condition, laid down on a piece of grey paper cut from an album. Faint franking postmark in red ink. Laid out in Palmerston’s neat and stylish hand in the customary way, and reading: ‘London February Twenty 1826 / Peter Legh Esqr. Junr / Haydock Lodge / Warrington’, with the signature ‘Palmerston’ at bottom left. See image.

See the entries for Baines and Reynolds in the Oxford DNB. 2pp, 12mo. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded twice. Addressed to ‘The Rev. H. R. Reynolds, D.D.’, and signed ‘Edw. Baines.’ The letter dates from between 1861, when Lord John Russell was created Earl Russell, and his death in 1878. Begins: ‘My very dear Friend, / I have just been shaking hands with Earl Russell. I was standing with the mob of M.

An evocative artefact of a bygone age of well-read men with substantial libraries. See Coleridge’s entry in the Oxford DNB (in addition to his achievements he was the great-nephew of the poet). 3pp, 12mo. On a bifolium. In good condition, lightly aged. Signed ‘Coleridge’ and addressed to ‘My dear Dickenson’. Coleridge’s hand is not an easy one, and the following rendition is in parts tentative. He begins by stating that he is touched ‘not a little’ by Dickenson’s letter, not having forgotten ‘old days in Harley Street & [St George’s?] Square’. He grieves at ‘the necessity you mention [i.e.

The 1880 'Balliol Masque' indicates Jowett's standing, and the pronunciation of his name: 'First come I. My name is Jowett. | There's no knowledge but I know it. | I am Master of this College, | What I don't know isn't knowledge.' See Jowett’s entry, and those of Lucas and Russell, in the Oxford DNB, which states regarding Jowett that by the end of his life he had become ‘synonymous with Balliol, which he turned into the leading college in the first university in the United Kingdom at the height of its world power’. 1p, 12mo. In good condition. Folded twice.

The printed item is excessively scarce: no copy on OCLC WorldCat or JISC. Transcriptions of both items are to be found in The Journal of the Legislative Council of the Province of New Brunswick, 20 January to 26 March, pp.26-28. The two items are in good condition, lightly aged and worn. Disbound from a volume and paginated in manuscript. ONE: Manuscript ‘Circular’ headed ‘Banking Companies’ and dated from Downing Street, 4 May 1840. 1p, 8vo. Paginated in manuscript 15. On W. Horsington paper with watermark date 1839.

Both items scarce: no other copy of either traced. Disbound from a volume and paginated in manuscript. In good condition, lightly aged. ONE: ‘Copy’ of letter to ‘The Right Honorable Lord John Russell’, signed in type ‘J. CAMPBELL, / T. WILDE.’ 2pp, 8vo. Paginated in manuscript 27-28. Printed in copperplate font. Begins: ‘My Lord, / We have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of Mr. Vernon Smith’s letter of the 3d inst.

All three items are scarce, with no copies on OCLC WorldCat or COPAC. Both in good condition, lightly aged. Disbound from a volume and paginated in manuscript. ONE: Printed ‘Circular’, headed in manuscript ‘Immiration / W. Indies & Mauritius’, and dated from Downing Street, 23 October 1846. Paginated in manuscript 93. At foot of page (not in Grey’s hand): ‘/sd/ Grey’.

An interesting indication of the Victorian approach to transparency in government. A scarce item: no other copy traced. Dispatch with ‘Circular. / Private.’ in the margin. Headed in manuscript ‘Publication of Colonial Papers. / (Parliamentary Papers)’. At end in manuscript (not Grey’s handwriting): ‘/sd/ Gray’. In good condition, lightly aged. 4pp, 8vo. Disbound from volume, and paginated in manuscript 175-178. Printed in copperplate font.

Two interesting items from the period leading up to the American Civil War. Both items are scarce: no other copy of either traced. In good condition, lightly aged. Disbound from a volume and paginated in manuscript.Both printed in copperplate font. ONE: Printed ‘Circular’ dated from Downing Street, 16 October 1850. Headed in manuscript ‘Colonial Emigrants from United States’. In manuscript at end (not in Grey’s hand) ‘/sd/ Grey’. 2pp, 8vo. Paginated in manuscript 239-240.

Both items scarce: no other copies traced. In good condition, lightly aged. Disbound from a volume and paginated in manuscript. ONE: Copy of letter from W. L. Maberly to ‘H. Merivale, Esq., / &c. &c. &c. / Colonial Office’, dated from General Post Office, 14 December 1850. 2pp, 8vo. Paginated in manuscript 257-258.

Scarce: no other copy traced. 1p, 8vo. In fair condition, lightly aged. Disbound from a volume and paginated in manuscript 37. Printed ‘Circular’ dated from Downing Street, 16 December 1842. Headed in manuscript ‘Crime in the high Seas’. At bottom, in manuscript (not Stanley’s hand): ‘/sd/ Stanley’. Twenty-nine lines in copperplate font.

Important items, reflecting the state of affairs regarding movement of West Africans to the British West India colonies in the period immediately following the abolition of slavery. Both items excessively scarce: no copies traced on either OCLC WorldCat or COPAC. In good condition, lightly aged. The two items disbound from a volume and paginated in manuscript. ONE: Printed ‘Circular’ dated ‘Downing Street, / 25th. February 1843.’ Lithographic reproduction of manuscript text, headed in real manuscript ‘Emigration from the W. Coast of Africa’.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 2pp, 12mo. Fifteen lines. In good condition. Folded once. Address to ‘Mr. de Winton’ and signed ‘Cross’. He finds that de Winton’s ‘last letter certainly makes a very considerable difference’, but ‘the obvious answer’ to his mind is, as de Winton only proposes ‘to reduce the York House from 112 to 110, it is hardly worth stirring up the waters at all. And especially so, as the population is increasing so rapidly that the next Census will probably alter the whole state of things.’

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. On 13 x 8 cm piece of laid paper. In fair condition, but with small sections torn away on removal from mount, at corners and at centre of top and bottom edges, damaging the first two numerals of the year. Reads: ‘May nine - <18>21 / Please to admit the bearer & his friend to the gallery of the House of Commons. / John C. Hobhouse’. See image.

The recipient is not named (the salutation is to ‘Mylord’), but William ends with compliments to ‘Lady Auckland’, and the letter also contains a reference to Eden Park. 1p, landscape 12mo. In fair condition, on aged paper, laid down on part of leaf cut from album. Signed ‘G. F. Pr Hed.d’Orange’. The mount is captioned, in a contemporary hand, ‘George [sic] Prince of Orange (Holland) date 1798’.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 4pp, 12mo. Bifolium. In good condition, with slight discoloration along central fold. Large bold signature ‘Napier’. Addressed to ‘The Honble. George Elliott’, with salutation to ‘My dear Elliott’. As he does not know where Elliott’s sister Lady Dunfermline is ‘residing at this moment’, he is placing in Elliott’s hands ‘for transmission’ a letter from the wife of the Turkish ambassador at the Hague. He expresses to Elliott’s family his sympathy at the loss of their father.

See Fisher’s entry in the Oxford DNB. Earlier in 1915 he had joined the Asquith government as Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board, and he would retain this post until June of 1917, when Lloyd George would promote him to the cabinet as President of the Local Government Board. The recipient Willoughby Hyett Dickinson (1859-1943), later an influential proponent of the League of Nations, began his career as a Liberal MP. He was knighted in 1918, and elevated to the peerage as Baron Dickinson of Painswick in 1930, the same year in which he joined the Labour Party.

See Fry’s entry in the Oxford DNB. Dickinson was an influential proponent of the League of Nations. The present item concerns the London Declaration concerning the Laws of Naval War, an international code of maritime law, following on from the second Hague Conference. Great Britain, as the world’s chief naval power, had felt that such a court should be governed by defined principles, and had convened an international concerence in London in 1908. The Declaration that was issued three years later comprised 71 articles. 3pp, 12mo. Bifolium. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded once.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. The recipient Lord Dickinson [Sir Willoughby Dickinson] (1859-1943), was a Liberal and then Labour politician and early advocate of the League of Nations.1p, 4to. In fair condition, lightly aged and creased, with short nick to one edge. Folded twice. He thanks him for the morning’s note, and is ‘adopting your suggestion to put down a Motion in the Lords’. He hopes that Dickinson will ‘add the weight of your name and influence in a letter to the Times’. He would like ‘the League of Nations Union would take the matter up’.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. The recipient, the educationist Thomas Lloyd Humberstone (1876-1957), was a prominent member of the Convocation of the University of London. Both items in fair condition, on lightly aged paper, the second with slight loss along one edge due to removal from mount. Both signed ‘Simon’. ONE: 17 January 1948. 1p, 12mo. Folded once. ‘I do not for a moment believe that the adverse vote carried at a depleted meeting of the General Committee represents the broad view of the Club [clearly the National Liberal Club] as a whole, but I have to take things as I find them.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. The recipient Thomas Lloyd Humberstone (1876-1957) was a prominent member of the Convocation of the University of London. The work referred to in this letter is probably Hankey's 'The Supreme Command', the two volumes of which would be published in 1961. 1p, 4to. In fair condition, lightly aged. Folded three times. He is returning his letter and ‘its interesting enclosure’. Not having had any experience of the Central Office of Information, he is left with the impression ‘that they are not very well informed on questions of Military Organisation’.

From the first Smith has been considered as the model of the ‘Sir Joseph Porter’ of Gilbert and Sullivan’s ‘HMS Pinafore’, and Disraeli himself is said to have referred to him as ‘Pinafore Smith’. See Smith’s entry in the Oxford DNB. The present item is signed ‘W. H. Smith’, addressed to ‘Mr Townsend Warner’, and headed ‘Private’. The recipient is the historian and Harrow housemaster George Townsend Warner (1865-1916), father of the novelist Sylvia Townsend Warner. 2pp, 12mo. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded once.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB: ‘Following Raglan's instructions, he wrote out the order which led to the fateful charge of the light brigade on 25 October 1854, but unfortunately in the heat of battle kept no duplicate. Subsequently, he had to request a copy from Lieutenant-General Lord Lucan, the cavalry division's commander, to whom the order was addressed and who strongly resented implications that he was at fault. In writing and in person Airey attempted to placate Lucan, reputedly arguing that “it is nothing to Chillianwallah”’.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. See David Owen, who was minister for the navy when Begg was appointed Admiral of the Fleet in 1968, commented on his death that Begg was 'an Admiral with salt both in his ears and his tongue', who 'did not suffer fools gladly' (The Independent, 15 July 1995). 2pp, 4to. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded once. Begins: ‘Dear Mr Dean. / I have signed the photograph as you asked.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 2pp, 12mo. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded once. Begins: ‘Dear Curzon, / I have sent, with great pleasure, a fiver to the Literary Fund in honour of your chairmanship; but not [last word underlined] as a successful man of letters.’ He explains that had he been dependant on his books for a livelihood, he would ‘long ago have starved, and, by the Grace of the present Government, I may yet be a burden to the Royal Literary Fund.’ Curzon has minuted the letter at the head of the first page: ‘Hon J Fortescue £5’.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. The recipient is the Harrow housemaster George Townsend Warner (1865-1916), father of the novelist Sylvia Townsend Warner, referred to as ‘Townsend Warner / Historian’ in a pencil note to this letter. Signed ‘Ian Hamilton’. 2pp, 12mo. On first leaf of bifolium. In good condition, lightly aged, with a few pin holes from attachment of a no-longer-present enclosure. Folded twice. Possibly concerning shooting practice for the Harrow army cadets.

An uncommon signature. During the 1794 invasion of Corsica, D’Aubant took over as Lord Hood’s second-in-command after Hood forced Major-General David Dundas to resign, but proved even more cautious, to the frustration of Nelson and others. 1p, landscape 8vo. Laid down on part of leaf from autograph album, captioned in Victorian hand, ‘General D’Aubant’. On discoloured paper, with deeper discoloration from glue from mount. Folded twice. Reads: ‘Genl D’Aubant presents his compliments to Mr Brown, and will call upon him at 12. next Thursday 8th July / Devonshe. place.’ See image.

The present item is producer Hugh Burnett's own copy, from his papers, of the transcript of John Freeman's interview with Thomson, broadcast in the groundbreaking BBC series 'Face to Face' on 4 February 1962. This single-spaced typed transcript was produced for inclusion in Burnett's book 'Face to Face / Edited and introduced by Hugh Burnett' (London: Jonathan Cape, 1964), and is marked up with printing instructions in pencil and red ink, with a few proof corrections in green ink. 1p, foolscap 8vo. In good condition, lightly aged. Emphasizing Thomson’s unthreatening ordinariness.