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Mr. and Mrs. Garrick: Some Unpublished Correspondence
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
In the rich but little known manuscript collection of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania are six letters by or to the David Garricks which, as far as I have been able to discover, have not been published. Three are signed-autograph letters of David Garrick; one is written by Mrs. Garrick to her friend Hannah More; and two are addressed to Garrick by acquaintances. While the group adds little to the Garrick biography, the letters themselves are interesting and should find their proper place in the Correspondence. The original spelling and punctuation are reproduced, with due allowance for typographical limitations.
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- Research Article
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1945
References
1 For permission to publish these letters the writer acknowledges indebtedness to the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
2 From the collection of the late Ferdinand Julius Dreer. It has been difficult to trace the history of the individual letters beyond the probable acquisition of most of them from the collection of Robert Gilmore of Baltimore, Md., in 1851.
3 Dreer Collection, Actors, Singers and Dancers, I.
4 The Reverend John Hoadly, 1711-76, son of Bishop Benjamin Hoadly.
5 The Reverend James Townley, Headmaster of Merchant Taylors' School. The Colman farce mentioned here is difficult to identify. The Clandestine Marriage was produced February 20, 1766—can there be any connection between this reference to Townley and the subsequent charges of plagiarism from Townley's False Concord? See Roberdeau, Fugitive Verse and Prose (London, 1801), ii, 106. For a further discussion of Roberdeau's charges see Elizabeth P. Stein, David Garrick, dramatist (New York, 1938), 235-236.
6 I have been unable to identify this name.
7 Benjamin Hoadly, M.D., 1706-57, author of The Suspicious Husband.
8 Private Correspondence of David Garrick (London, 1831-32), i, 167.
9 Some Unpublished Correspondence of David Garrick, ed. G. P. Baker (Boston, 1907), p. 118.
10 Private Correspondence of David Garrick, i, 191-192.
11 William Bowyer, 1699-1777. “… had I not delayed till an absolute answer came from my friend David Garrick, with his fixed resolution never more ‘to strut & fret his hour upon the stage again.‘ This decree has unhinged my schemes with regard to Lord Cromwell, for nothing but the concurrence of so many circumstances in my favour (his entire disinterested friendship for me, and the good Doctor's memory; Mrs. Hoadly's bringing on a piece of the Doctor's at the same time; the story of mine being on a religious subject, etc… . could have persuaded me to break through the prudery of my profession and … produce a play upon the Stage.” John Nichols, Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Century (London, 1812-16), iii, 142-143.
12 The Widow of the Mill was one of a group of “poor Ben's” minor efforts over which brother and widow quarreled. John Hoadly finally besought Garrick's assistance in protecting his brother's literary reputation from the mercenary purposes of “Madame Charles Street.” See Private Correspondence of David Garrick, i, 167 ff.; Baker, op. cit., p. 47.
13 Private Correspondence of David Garrick, i, 192.
14 Idem, i, 199.
15 Henry Wilmot, of Farnborough Place.
16 Thomas Becket, publisher and friend of Garrick.
17 See Drury Lane Calendar, 1747-76, Comp. D. MacMillan (Oxford, 1938), p. 195.
18 Two volumes (London, 1841), i, 400.
19 Isaac Schomberg, 1714-78, physician and friend of Garrick.
20 Published in The London Packet, six essays dated July 10, 12, 26, August 7, October 25, and December 4, 1775. The second, fourth and sixth essays signed “Blackguard.” See Colman, Prose on Several Occasions, etc., 3 vols. (London, 1787), vol. i; and Eugene R. Page, George Colman, the elder, essayist, dramatist, and theatrical manager (New York, 1935), p. 230.
21 Private Correspondence of David Garrick, ii, 142.
22 The Letters of Hannah More, ed. R. B. Johnson (New York, 1926), p. 30.
23 Two volumes (London, 1868). It should be noted that these dates were not changed in the “revised” one-volume edition of 1899.
24 Dreer Collection, Actors, Singers and Dancers, I.
25 Private Correspondence of David Garrick, i, 409-410; ii, 33-34, 95, 337-338.
26 See article in the Dictionary of National Biography.
27 Wilkes was arrested April 27, 1768. His friendship with Lloyd continued, and June 12, 1770, he writes to his daughter at Paris, “… Mr. Lloyd, the parson and poet, dined at Fulham with me on Sunday. He will soon publish an excellent satirical poem… .” See Correspondence of John Wilkes with his friends, ed. Almon and Rough (London, 1804-05), iv, 48-49.
28 Thomas Mortimer (1730-1810), a friend of Wilkes.
29 Private Correspondence of David Garrick, i, 294-295.
30 Op. cit., p. 133.
31 Dreer Collection, English Clergy, I. The Collection includes other items pertaining to the forgery.
32 Op. cit., i, 421-422. See also, Percy Fitzgerald, A Famous Forgery (London, 1865).
33 Fitzgerald's version is actually a paraphrase throughout, although it is placed within quotation marks—“to request the honour of Mr. & Mrs. Garrick's company at dinner at Blackheath, and that Mrs. Dodd and Mr. Stanhope will be of the party, and attend him, and he hopes Mr. Garrick will not refuse him the satisfaction of taking a piece of mutton at Ealing.” (Italics are mine. H.W.P.)
34 Dreer Collection, English Statesmen, i.
35 William Gerard Hamilton, 1729-96.
36 Burke accompanied Hamilton to Ireland in 1761 as a private secretary when the latter became Chief Secretary to Lord Halifax, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.
37 See the Will of Richard Burke, 4 November, 1761, printed in The Early Life Correspondence and Writings of the Rt. Hon. Edmund Burke, LL. D., etc., ed. A. P. I. Samuels and A. W. Samuels (Cambridge Press, 1923), Appendix v, 405-407.
38 Ultimately Hamilton did fulfill his promise to Burke, securing him a pension of £300 a year on the Irish Establishment, 1763. The pension was relinquished as a point of honor when Burke severed his unpleasant relationship with Hamilton in 1765. See John Morley, Edmund Burke (Oxford, 1931).
39 I have been unable to identify this publication.
40 Dreer Collection, Actors, Singers and Dancers, i.
41 Mrs. Mary Dickenson, wife of John Dickenson, mother of Lady Anson.
42 Lady Anson, née Louisa Frances Mary Dickenson, married Gen. Sir William Anson, 1st Bart., K. C. B., January 26, 1815.
43 Albany Wallis, Garrick's solicitor. For an account of his business with Sheridan see Walter S. Sichel, Sheridan, from new and original material, 2 vols. (Boston, 1909), ii, 275n.
44 Op. cit., i, 355; ii, 255-256.