4173. Robert Southey to Henry Herbert Southey, 19 April 1824

 

Address: To/ Dr Southey./ 15. Queen Anne Street/ Cavendish Square/ London
Stamped: KESWICK/ 298
Postmark: E/ 23 AP 23/ 1824
Seal: red wax; design illegible
MS: Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, MS. Don. d. 4. ALS; 4p. 
Unpublished.

Keswick. 19 Apr. 1824
My dear Harry

I have had a visit from Edward. He made his appearance this day week, & took his departure yesterday having spent part of his time at Toms. He looks very thin, tho he thinks himself in tolerable health & is certainly in good spirits. I know not how he has managed to pick up a strong West-country pronunciation. He talked very rationally concerning his own condition & prospects & what little he said of the past was what it ought save only that he was what an Inquisitor would call diminuto

(1)

Literally ‘tiny’. The term was used of a penitent who did not make a full and total confession to the Inquisition and could thus still be condemned.

in his acknowledgements of misconduct. Of course I said nothing upon those subjects. He went away well pleased with his reception, – & tho I cannot say I was glad to see him, I am by no means sorry that he has been here. His engagement at Liverpool is just expired, & he is in treaty for one at Cheltenham: if that fails he expects to go again to Boulogne, & to engage again at Liverpool for next winter.

I have lost the Courier in consequence of Stuarts withdrawing altogether from the concern.

(2)

Southey had received a free copy of the daily evening newspaper, the Courier, because of Daniel Stuart’s association with this publication. Once Stuart sold his remaining shares in 1824 this arrangement ceased.

He had sent me ever since I have been in this country. This is a sad loss. Can you put me in the way of getting a daily paper at half price, according to the common arrangement. A morning one it must be, – & I care not whether M Post, Herald or N Times.

(3)

Southey switched to the Morning Herald (1780–1869), a daily newspaper which at this time was non-aligned between Whigs and Tories. The Morning Post (1772–1937) and the New Times (1817–1828) were clearly pro-government.

– Public affairs are not very interesting just now; – but it will not do for me to be ignorant of what is going on in the world.

One effort more I have made to obtain this provoking history of the Catalan campaigns,

(4)

Southey had read John Mitford’s ‘On Spanish Literature, with some Account of Francisco de Olivarez’, New Monthly Magazine, 10 (October 1818), 221–223. It mentioned Olivarez’s Account of the War in Catalonia, published in four volumes at Seville in 1815; Anecdotes of Chiefs Employed in the Catalan War (1816); and Memoirs of the Spanish Monarchy to the Abdication of Charles 4 & the Usurpation of Joseph Bonaparte (1816). However, none of these works seem to exist. Southey had already asked Murray to try and acquire them; see Southey to John Murray: 10 July 1820, The Collected Letters of Robert So…

& if that fails I wait no longer, but on the first of May send off the commencement of my second volume to the press.

(5)

The second volume of Southey’s History of the Peninsular War (1823–1832).

I know not how the B of the Ch.

(6)

Southey’s The Book of the Church (1824).

has sold, not having heard a word from Murray since my return. It will be quite a comfort to see a proof sheet again – for I cannot remember having ever been so long without one for the last twenty or five & twenty years. – I am getting on with the Tale of Paraguay,

(7)

Southey’s A Tale of Paraguay (1825).

making it now my main business. The second canto will probably be finished before this reaches you. And as there are but two more, you know how quickly the latter half of a journey is usually performed by one who desires to arrive at the end of it.

My house is dismal enough at this time all the children being absent. Kate Bel & Cuthbert are at Rydal, from whence they are to return tomorrow or Thursday. Bertha arrived safely in Palace Yard on Thursday afternoon last, & went off on the Saturday for Sussex, there to remain during the recess. – EMay will probably return to London before her. I miss them both, & shall be heartily glad to have them at home again.

You probably know that Col. Hill is dead.

(8)

Edward Hill (1733–1824) was the son of Edward Hill (1705–1765), a lawyer of Long Ashton, Somerset, by his first marriage. The elder Edward Hill married, as his second wife, Margaret Bradford (1710–1782), the mother of Southey’s mother, Margaret Southey, and of his uncle, Herbert Hill. There was a severe family rift between the younger Edward Hill and his half-brother, Herbert Hill.

Both Tom & Edward insist that he has left a family. If so it must be an illegitimate one, for it is not more than four or five years since he married.

(9)

There were no surviving descendants from Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Hill’s marriage to his first wife, Frances (1738–1808). However, he had made a late second marriage to Hester Brown (1766–1834), a widow with five children, and this may have been the source of the rumour that Hill had ‘left a family’.

However, xxx if he had died single & intestate, his property whatever it might have been, would not have come to the half blood,

(10)

i.e. to Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Hill’s half-brother, Herbert Hill, and Herbert Hill’s descendants, and to the descendants of Edward Hill’s half-sister, Margaret Southey.

– but to his mothers

(11)

Unidentified.

relation – of whom I believe the Wasbroughs

(12)

There was a family of that name in Bedminster, near the Hills’ ancestral home, at this time and they may have been relations of the Hills. Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Hill left a will, though, and his main heir was his second wife, Hester Hill.

are the nearest. He was in his 90th year. It is from the newspapers that I learnt his death

(13)

‘On the 22nd inst., at his home, Lansdown-place East, Bath, Lieut.-Colonel Hill, Royal Marines, aged upwards of 90 years’ (Morning Post, 26 March 1824).

Love to Louisa & the children – God bless you
RS.

Would it be possible to procure a series of the Lisbon Gazettes from the beginning of 1809 till the end of the war? – I would give one of my ears for them.

(14)

The postscript is written at the head of fol. 1.

Notes

1. Literally ‘tiny’. The term was used of a penitent who did not make a full and total confession to the Inquisition and could thus still be condemned.[back]
2. Southey had received a free copy of the daily evening newspaper, the Courier, because of Daniel Stuart’s association with this publication. Once Stuart sold his remaining shares in 1824 this arrangement ceased.[back]
3. Southey switched to the Morning Herald (1780–1869), a daily newspaper which at this time was non-aligned between Whigs and Tories. The Morning Post (1772–1937) and the New Times (1817–1828) were clearly pro-government.[back]
4. Southey had read John Mitford’s ‘On Spanish Literature, with some Account of Francisco de Olivarez’, New Monthly Magazine, 10 (October 1818), 221–223. It mentioned Olivarez’s Account of the War in Catalonia, published in four volumes at Seville in 1815; Anecdotes of Chiefs Employed in the Catalan War (1816); and Memoirs of the Spanish Monarchy to the Abdication of Charles 4 & the Usurpation of Joseph Bonaparte (1816). However, none of these works seem to exist. Southey had already asked Murray to try and acquire them; see Southey to John Murray: 10 July 1820, The Collected Letters of Robert Southey. Part Six, Letter 3509; 27 February 1821, The Collected Letters of Robert Southey. Part Six, Letter 3641; 11 June 1821, The Collected Letters of Robert Southey. Part Six, Letter 3693; and 27 July 1822, Letter 3877 and 1 November [1822], Letter 3911. Murray had then written to Spain to try and obtain these books for Southey’s History of the Peninsular War (1823–1832), and Herbert Hill had also offered to help. Southey had then sought the assistance of George Canning. Finally, Southey had written to John Mitford, 12 April 1824, Letter 4171.[back]
5. The second volume of Southey’s History of the Peninsular War (1823–1832).[back]
6. Southey’s The Book of the Church (1824).[back]
7. Southey’s A Tale of Paraguay (1825).[back]
8. Edward Hill (1733–1824) was the son of Edward Hill (1705–1765), a lawyer of Long Ashton, Somerset, by his first marriage. The elder Edward Hill married, as his second wife, Margaret Bradford (1710–1782), the mother of Southey’s mother, Margaret Southey, and of his uncle, Herbert Hill. There was a severe family rift between the younger Edward Hill and his half-brother, Herbert Hill.[back]
9. There were no surviving descendants from Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Hill’s marriage to his first wife, Frances (1738–1808). However, he had made a late second marriage to Hester Brown (1766–1834), a widow with five children, and this may have been the source of the rumour that Hill had ‘left a family’.[back]
10. i.e. to Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Hill’s half-brother, Herbert Hill, and Herbert Hill’s descendants, and to the descendants of Edward Hill’s half-sister, Margaret Southey.[back]
11. Unidentified.[back]
12. There was a family of that name in Bedminster, near the Hills’ ancestral home, at this time and they may have been relations of the Hills. Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Hill left a will, though, and his main heir was his second wife, Hester Hill.[back]
13. ‘On the 22nd inst., at his home, Lansdown-place East, Bath, Lieut.-Colonel Hill, Royal Marines, aged upwards of 90 years’ (Morning Post, 26 March 1824).[back]
14. The postscript is written at the head of fol. 1.[back]
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