BROWN'S

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. In good condition, lightly aged. On first leaf of a bifolium of wove paper. Folded for postage. Signed ‘Tho. Hughes’. Begins: ‘My dear Ponsonby / Let me introduce the bearer, Mr. Selway, [i.e. William Robbins Selway (c.1822-1893) of Walworth] who was vice Chairman of my Committee in Lambeth, & is one of the most influential & trustworthy men in the South of London’. Selway wishes to see Ponsonby ‘about a building in the Surrey Gardens which certain persons are proposing to convert into a Theatre’.

2pp, 12mo. Bifolium. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded twice. Clearly and firmly written. The letter would appear to concern an individual who is threatening to resign his membership of the Athenaeum Club, and ends with reference to proxy voting for new members. Hughes begins by reporting that he has 'already written to the good but peppery & impulsive Dr. of whom I am as fond as you are'.

Autograph Note initialled written by Hughes in the space above the beginning of another's letter to him (the reverse mentions a Mrs Morland, suggesting the correspondent is a Mr Morland), slightly grubby and signs of wear,c.6 x 1". An autograph collector has snipped the Hughes note off the letter (rest now lost) and stuck it in an album from which I have removed it. A date has been added in a different hand (1826) and the note runs as follows: "Be good enough to pay £5 for me to the Vaudois or Waldenses, at Hoare's [Bank]. They were the first germ of Protestantism.

Three pages, 4to, but cross-written, making six pages of writing, sometimes hard to read, small piece of letter with a few words detached but present. Mrs Hughes is her usual informative, authoritative, lively and intelligent self, initially discussing the British disaster at Buenos Ayres. being unable to think of "a worse planned or more ill-fated expedition" in which the dead were "sacrificed". She attacks the commander, the Duke of York, in no uncertain terms: she hopes it's not a crime to wish him out of a world to which he he'd done so little good.