Diplomatic Text
Holbrooke Wed: Morg
1st. April 1795
My dearest Mary
I came here a little past four
yesterday & had a very friendly reception --
& had the pleasure of finding Mrs. B. quite
well -- & her fine Boy[1] -- On Monday we walked
out at ten OClock Mr Birch went to
Lathkill & I staid in Bakewell Meadows
where I fished till half past three -- the old
practitioner shewed me how to throw the
line & I very soon caught hold of a fish
at which I give a strong pluck -- the man
rubbed his hands & laughed heartily to see
so great a fool & said if the fish had kept
his hold I shd. have thrown him as high
out of the Water as Bakewell Steeple --
I improved upon the hint & (to make short
of my story), caught in a capital Style
fifteen fish -- ten Graylings -- two trouts
& three Salmon trouts -- 9 were takable fish & 6 were
returned to the Stream. with proper admonitions
& friendly advice not to trust too much to appearance,
We dined at 4 -- 6 were invited, 5 red hot Democrats
& we played at Cards till past eleven -- Tuesday
after breakfast I called upon Mr Mander, one of
yesterdays party to see a small collection of Medals
& Coins -- his father was an Antiquary -- unluckily
he was called out upon busineʃs & I only saw
him for 5 minutes but I looked over his collection
but had not time enough to examine them
as Birch had promised to attend me to Rowter[2]
at a certain hour, so I returned & we set off
but unluckily when we got to Haddon the
rain came on -- he returned to Bakewell & I jogged
on to Matlock -- I gave up seeing the druidical
temple till another time -- I was very much
affronted that no credit was given to my Succeʃs
in fishing as every body asked me how many Whi ---
had hooked for me & of course how many the Baby
brought out of the Water -- I was also flattered to
find by a general Acknowledgment that there had
not been so succeʃsful a Coup d'eʃsai known
there -- I met Kershaw fishing there -- this puts
me in mind that my Arm aches grievously
still -- Miʃs Pretty face is going to Derby at
9 OClock & will take this letter which you
will have tomorrow -- Bradshaw[3] tells me
there was a pair of hawks sold in this
Neighborhood a short time since that
wd. have suited my father exactly --
I must dreʃs & go down to Breakfast
Therefore good morrow to yr night Cap
God bleʃs you ma tres chere
Votre J.D—— --
Love to Louisa &c --
Mrs. Dickenson[4]
Birch Hall[5]
Manchester
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)
Notes
1. Most of the letter concerns Dickenson's activities in and around Bakewell, his host apparently a Mr Birch. He leaves Bakewell on Tuesday 31 March and rides via Matlock to Holbrook, near Derby, where he encounters Mrs B. – possibly Mrs Birch – and her son.
2. Rowtor Rocks, above Birchover, a Druid site.
3. Possibly the Mr Bradshaw from Derby mentioned in HAM/2/16 p.22.
4. Postmark ‘DERBY’ above address.
5. This line of the address is preceded by a large ‘4’, indicating postage due.
Normalised Text
Holbrooke Wednesday Morning
1st. April 1795
My dearest Mary
I came here a little past four
yesterday & had a very friendly reception --
& had the pleasure of finding Mrs. B. quite
well -- & her fine Boy -- On Monday we walked
out at ten O'Clock Mr Birch went to
Lathkill & I stayed in Bakewell Meadows
where I fished till half past three -- the old
practitioner showed me how to throw the
line & I very soon caught hold of a fish
at which I give a strong pluck -- the man
rubbed his hands & laughed heartily to see
so great a fool & said if the fish had kept
his hold I should have thrown him as high
out of the Water as Bakewell Steeple --
I improved upon the hint & (to make short
of my story), caught in a capital Style
fifteen fish -- ten Graylings -- two trouts
& three Salmon trouts -- 9 were takable fish & 6 were
returned to the Stream. with proper admonitions
& friendly advice not to trust too much to appearance,
We dined at 4 -- 6 were invited, 5 red hot Democrats
& we played at Cards till past eleven -- Tuesday
after breakfast I called upon Mr Mander, one of
yesterdays party to see a small collection of Medals
& Coins -- his father was an Antiquary -- unluckily
he was called out upon business & I only saw
him for 5 minutes but I looked over his collection
but had not time enough to examine them
as Birch had promised to attend me to Rowter
at a certain hour, so I returned & we set off
but unluckily when we got to Haddon the
rain came on -- he returned to Bakewell & I jogged
on to Matlock -- I gave up seeing the druidical
temple till another time -- I was very much
affronted that no credit was given to my Success
in fishing as every body asked me how many Whi ---
had hooked for me & of course how many the Baby
brought out of the Water -- I was also flattered to
find by a general Acknowledgment that there had
not been so successful a Coup d'essai known
there -- I met Kershaw fishing there -- this puts
me in mind that my Arm aches grievously
still -- Miss Pretty face is going to Derby at
9 O'Clock & will take this letter which you
will have tomorrow -- Bradshaw tells me
there was a pair of hawks sold in this
Neighbourhood a short time since that
would have suited my father exactly --
I must dress & go down to Breakfast
Therefore good morrow to your night Cap
God bless you ma tres chere
Votre John Dickenson --
Love to Louisa &c --
Mrs. Dickenson
Birch Hall
Manchester
quotations, spellings, uncorrected forms, split words, abbreviations, formatting)
Notes
Metadata
Library References
Repository: John Rylands Research Institute and Library, University of Manchester
Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers
Item title: Letter from John Dickenson to Mary Hamilton
Shelfmark: HAM/1/2/38
Correspondence Details
Sender: John Dickenson
Place sent: Holbrook, Derbyshire
Addressee: Mary Hamilton
Place received: Rusholme, near Manchester
Date sent: 1 April 1795
Letter Description
Summary: Letter from John Dickenson to his wife Mary née Hamilton. He writes of a visit to Mr and Mrs Birch and of going fishing while there. He tells a story against himself of being taught to throw a line and then being told that 'if the fish had kept his hold', he would 'have thrown him as high out of the Water as Bakewell Steeple'. He soon improves and brings home a fine catch. He dined at four and played cards in the evening.
Length: 1 sheet, 456 words
Transliteration Information
Editorial declaration: First edited in the project 'Image to Text' (David Denison & Nuria Yáñez-Bouza, 2013-2019), now incorporated 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: Research Assistant funding in 2017/18 provided by the Department of Linguistics and English Language, University of Manchester.
Research assistant: Georgia Tutt, MA student, University of Manchester
Transliterator: Sam Hepburn, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted May 2018)
Cataloguer: Lisa Crawley, Archivist, The John Rylands Library
Cataloguer: John Hodgson, Head of Special Collections, John Rylands Research Institute and Library
Copyright: Transcriptions, notes and TEI/XML © the editors
Revision date: 2 November 2021