Unlocking the Mary Hamilton papers

Single Letter

HAM/1/7/12/9

Letter from Mrs Catherine Walkinshaw to Mary Hamilton

Diplomatic Text


9.

31st. May 1781[1]


      I return my Dear Miʃs Hamilton my very affectionat thanks
for her obliging note, and beg she will be aʃsured that
nothing but haveing been so much Confined with bad
health this Spring, could have prevented me from trying
to have had the pleasure of seeing her often in this
House, and of Cultivateing every opportunity of waiting
of her at St James's, but when one is ill one has no spirits
to doe either what is right, or what one wishes, I now
lamented it the more, as I cannot doe what I had very
much at heart paying my Duty to my King upon
his Birth day, I have nursed my self with great
Care and have realy my Cloths ready, but must not
venture to goe, as I should not be equal to the fatigue


What makes me regrate it the more, is the not seeing
the young Royall family which I had realy set
my heart upon seeing, as I have not had that
happyneʃs and pleasure this two year, how ever
I must hope the best an other year, I hope my health
will be better, and will indeavour to pay my Duty
upon a quiet day, to there Majestys befor I leave town,
I bliʃs good I am much better tho not well,
I hope you are perfectly so, and beg you will
be aʃsured of the affectionat regard of
                                                         my Dear Miʃs Hamilton
                                                         your much obliged and fathfull
                                                         Servt Cath Walkinshaw
Maddox Street May 30th
                    1781[2]

I will indeavour if posible if I can get out in time to
call some morning, if I should not I wish you every happineʃs

(hover over blue text or annotations for clarification;
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)


Notes


 1. The letter when completed was dated 30 May by Mrs Walkinshaw below. A second date was added by someone else at the top of the page – possibly the date of posting.
 2. This dateline appears to the left of the closing salutation.

Normalised Text





      I return my Dear Miss Hamilton my very affectionate thanks
for her obliging note, and beg she will be assured that
nothing but having been so much Confined with bad
health this Spring, could have prevented me from trying
to have had the pleasure of seeing her often in this
House, and of Cultivating every opportunity of waiting
of her at St James's, but when one is ill one has no spirits
to do either what is right, or what one wishes, I now
lamented it the more, as I cannot do what I had very
much at heart paying my Duty to my King upon
his Birth day, I have nursed my self with great
Care and have really my Clothes ready, but must not
venture to go, as I should not be equal to the fatigue


What makes me regret it the more, is the not seeing
the young Royal family which I had really set
my heart upon seeing, as I have not had that
happiness and pleasure this two year, however
I must hope the best an other year, I hope my health
will be better, and will endeavour to pay my Duty
upon a quiet day, to their Majestys before I leave town,
I bless God I am much better though not well,
I hope you are perfectly so, and beg you will
be assured of the affectionate regard of
                                                         my Dear Miss Hamilton
                                                         your much obliged and faithful
                                                         Servant Catherine Walkinshaw
Maddox Street May 30th
               1781

I will endeavour if possible if I can get out in time to
call some morning, if I should not I wish you every happiness

(consult diplomatic text or XML for annotations, deletions, clarifications, persons,
quotations, spellings, uncorrected forms, split words, abbreviations, formatting)



 1. The letter when completed was dated 30 May by Mrs Walkinshaw below. A second date was added by someone else at the top of the page – possibly the date of posting.
 2. This dateline appears to the left of the closing salutation.

Metadata

Library References

Repository: John Rylands Research Institute and Library, University of Manchester

Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers

Item title: Letter from Mrs Catherine Walkinshaw to Mary Hamilton

Shelfmark: HAM/1/7/12/9

Correspondence Details

Sender: Catherine Walkinshaw

Place sent: London

Addressee: Mary Hamilton

Place received: unknown

Date sent: from 30 to 31 May 1781
from 30 May 1781 (precision: high)
to 31 May 1781 (precision: high)

Letter Description

Summary: Letter from Catherine Walkinshaw to Mary Hamilton, relating to Hamilton's health and the King's birthday. She laments not having seen her more often this Spring, 'but when one is ill one has no spirits to doe either what is right, or what one wishes'. She particularly regrets not having seen the young Royal family, but she hopes that her health will improve and that she will be able to pay her duty to their Majesties 'on a quiet day' before she leaves town.
    Dated at Maddox Street [London].
    Original reference No. 9.
   

Length: 1 sheet, 277 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 2014/15 and 2015/16 provided by the Department of Linguistics and English Language, University of Manchester.

Research assistant: Isabella Formisano, former MA student, University of Manchester

Transliterator: Rose Halligan, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted May 2016)

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

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