4131. Robert Southey to Ebenezer Elliott, 9 February 1824

 

Address: To/ Mr E. Elliott/ Sheffield
Stamped: [partial] RICHMOND/ 1824 
Postmark: NIGHT/ FE 9/ 1824
MS: Sheffield Archives, MD2191/29. ALS; 4p.
Previously published: E. R. Seary, ‘Robert Southey and Ebenezer Elliott: Some New Southey Letters’, Review of English Studies, 15 (October 1939), 418.

Richmond. 9 Feby. 1824.

I have been travelling far & wide, East, West & South, since I received your most interesting letter. The last place at which I halted was Cambridge, & there I have succeeded in doing, what I hoped to do. A friend of mine at Peter House, who is one of the Senior Fellows & takes an active part in the management of the College (Tilbrooke is his name, – the same person who wrote a pamphlett against my hexameters –)

(1)

Samuel Tillbrook, Historical and Critical Remarks upon the Modern Hexametrists, and Upon Mr Southey’s Vision of Judgment (1822), a critique of Southey’s Vision of Judgement (1821).

– will secure a Sizarship for your son,

(2)

Ebenezer Elliott (1807–1871), eldest son of Ebenezer Elliott. He matriculated at Peterhouse College, Cambridge, in 1825 as a sizar (i.e. a student receiving some form of financial assistance) and obtained his BA in 1829. He became a clergyman and was Perpetual Curate of New Mill, Huddersfield 1841–1843, and Lothersdale, near Skipton 1844–1848, later going to St Kitts in the West Indies and serving as Rector of Christ Church, Nichola Town, and St Mary’s, Cayou.

which, if you can supply him with 60£ a year, will well enable him to go thro College. There is also a possibility & a prospect of obtaining other helps for him, (- such as might cover his whole expences if he were at this time qualified to enter:) xxxx if they fall vacant when he is in a condition to receive them. With diligence & good fortune conduct his success is certain.

You had better place him now where he can be brought forward in Greek, Latin & Mathematicks. He will not find his progress difficult under good tuition. These are the objects to which he must attend. English will come of itself. Is there a good school at Sheffield? It is of main importance that he should be placed now under judicious guidance. Let xx him but be put fairly into the right course, & your best wishes for him may be accomplished.

It was on Thursday last that I saw Tilbrooke, & spoke with him. From that day I have not had ten minutes till now in which I could sit down & communicate this, much as I wished to do it. My place is taken in the Carlisle mail for Friday next, & on Sunday morning I hope to reach home, after the longest absence which I have ever made from my family, since I had one. Direct to Keswick. If you cannot satisfy yourself about any school in your own neighbourhood shall I enquire concerning those in the North? There is one in good repute at Richmond; – there is one at Sedburg, – one at St Bees.

(3)

Richmond School, a medieval grammar school foundation, which under James Tate (1771–1843; DNB), Headmaster 1796–1833, gained a formidable reputation for sending excellent scholars to Cambridge University; Sedbergh School, founded 1525, had the right to send eight of its pupils to scholarships at St John’s College, Cambridge; and St Bees School in Cumbria, founded in 1583, could send three of its pupils to scholarships at Pembroke College, Cambridge.

Present my kind regards to Mrs Elliott

(4)

Frances Gartside (b. 1781). She and Ebenezer Elliott had married in 1806 and had thirteen children.

of whom you have said so much that I am as solicitous for your sons welfare, on her account, as on yours. – & believe me to be – with great esteem & respect – truly & heartily yours

Robert Southey.

Remember me kindly to Mr Everett, – & to Montgomery, to whom I will write when I am settled at Keswick.

Notes

1. Samuel Tillbrook, Historical and Critical Remarks upon the Modern Hexametrists, and Upon Mr Southey’s Vision of Judgment (1822), a critique of Southey’s Vision of Judgement (1821).[back]
2. Ebenezer Elliott (1807–1871), eldest son of Ebenezer Elliott. He matriculated at Peterhouse College, Cambridge, in 1825 as a sizar (i.e. a student receiving some form of financial assistance) and obtained his BA in 1829. He became a clergyman and was Perpetual Curate of New Mill, Huddersfield 1841–1843, and Lothersdale, near Skipton 1844–1848, later going to St Kitts in the West Indies and serving as Rector of Christ Church, Nichola Town, and St Mary’s, Cayou.[back]
3. Richmond School, a medieval grammar school foundation, which under James Tate (1771–1843; DNB), Headmaster 1796–1833, gained a formidable reputation for sending excellent scholars to Cambridge University; Sedbergh School, founded 1525, had the right to send eight of its pupils to scholarships at St John’s College, Cambridge; and St Bees School in Cumbria, founded in 1583, could send three of its pupils to scholarships at Pembroke College, Cambridge.[back]
4. Frances Gartside (b. 1781). She and Ebenezer Elliott had married in 1806 and had thirteen children.[back]
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