LYME

[Lyme Regis, Dorset.] Autograph Letter Signed from ‘Wm Curtis’ [William Curtis] to ‘Mr Wh[encon?] / Town Clerk / Lym’, regarding legal action with ‘Mr Preston’ (‘Mr Recorder’) who ‘Threatens to play the very Devil’ with him.

Author: 
Lyme Regis, Dorset: William Curtis of Lym [Richard Preston ('Mr Recorder') of Marino; Lowton of the Temple]
Publication details: 
‘Lym July 1 / 1795’. [Lyme Regis, Dorset.]
£50.00

Neither Curtis nor the 'Mr Recorder' named Preston mentioned in the letter feature in G. Roberts’s ‘History of Lyme Regis’ (Sherborne, 1823). Preston may be ‘Richard Preston Esq.’ of ‘Marino’ named as living near Barnstaple in Cary’s New Itinerary, 6th ed, 1815. The recipient’s name is not decipherable. Six years previously a parliamentary committee had examined ‘Mr. Follett, the town clerk of Lyme. He said, he had held that office fifty years.’ (Luders, Reports, 1789) 2pp, 4to. On first leaf of bifolium, the reverse of the second leaf being addressed to ‘Mr Wh[encon?] / Town Clerk / Lym’.

[The 5th Duke of Newcastle, as Colonial Secretary.] Autograph Letter Signed ('Newcastle'), regarding the 'system of promotion in the Colonial Service', in reply to the recommendation by Liberal MP and banker Thomson Hankey that he employ 'Mr Price'.

Author: 
Henry Pelham Fiennes Pelham-Clinton, 5th Duke of Newcastle under Lyme (1811-1864), Liberal politician [Thomson Hankey junior (1805-1893), banker and MP]
Publication details: 
Colonial Office [Whitehall, London]. 27 September 1853.
£135.00

3pp., 4to. Bifolium. Very good, on lightly-aged paper. Newcastle has already been informed of Price's wish to be placed in the Colonial Office by 'the Duke of Roxburghe and others, whose interest in his wefare, would have great weight with me, if I felt that I could consistently with the present claims upon me, hold out any hope of complying with Mr. Price's request'.

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