BECKFORD

The connection between the two firms of London bankers Thompson Hankey & Co., and Plummer & Wilson & Co. is unclear, but after the bankruptcy of John Plummer and William Wilson of Fenchurch Street 1831, a new firm named Hankey, Plummer & Wilson was formed, Plummer & Wilson bringing to it a number of clients including Beckford. The source of Beckford's vast wealth was of course the family's sugar plantations in the West Indies, and this document dates from before the abolition of slavery. 3pp., foolscap 8vo. Bifolium. Very good, on laid paper with Britannia watermark of 'E SMITH | 1828'.

12mo: 3 pp. Bifoilum. Thirty-six lines. Text clear and complete. Fair, on aged paper, with several pin holes, light spotting, and a 1 cm closed tear along a fold. A lighthearted epistle, beginning 'Dear Everard, Dear Everard | The Cistercians make an awful mistake in giving free meals. My Charity-organisation Society temperament rises in wrath: if they wd only apply the labour test for an hour or less - but free meals! I have watched the moral ravages of free meals and feel more strongly abt that kind of thing than about Home rule or Mediaeval Brases.

12mo, 4 pp. Good. A bifolium, attached by a strip along the inner margin to a leaf removed from an autograph album, docketed 'Mrs. Hobart Hampden, Authoress of "The Changed Cross" '. Postscript written vertically across the upper part of the first page. Concerns a photograph of the recipient's mother: a 'sweet souvenir of such a rare & precious jewel as your dear & beautiful Mother; whom we feel it such a privelidge [sic] to see and to know'.

Susan Euphemia Beckford ("one of the handsomest women of her time" (quoted in DNB), 7 m. Marquis of Douglas in 1810. Two pages, somewhat grubby but text clear and complete. "The 5 Vols: of Grimms[sic] Correspondence which Mr. Clarke sent to Gros[veno]r Place for the Marchioness of Douglas are just arrived at Hamilton Palace in a Case wh.