BIB_ID
429781
Accession number
MA 14286.21
Creator
Knox, Maria, 1795-1822, sender.
Display Date
Nasirabad, India, 1821 February 16.
Credit line
Bequest of Gordon N. Ray, 1987.
Description
1 item (6 pages) ; 25.2 x 20 cm
Notes
Address panel with postmark and remains of seal: Mrs. Butler / Care of Lieut Colonel Wood / Engineers / Fort William [crossed out] / Barrackpore.
Letter incomplete and lacking the first portion of text.
"the Conway Captain Hall" refers to HMS Conway under the command of Captain Basil Hall, which sailed from England to South America on August 10, 1820. It returned to England in 1823. See John Marshall, Royal Naval Biography Supplement Part IV (London, 1830), 154-182.
Forms part of a collection (MA 14286.1-66) of letters written by Maria Knox to her mother, Mrs. Harriet Butler.
Letter incomplete and lacking the first portion of text.
"the Conway Captain Hall" refers to HMS Conway under the command of Captain Basil Hall, which sailed from England to South America on August 10, 1820. It returned to England in 1823. See John Marshall, Royal Naval Biography Supplement Part IV (London, 1830), 154-182.
Forms part of a collection (MA 14286.1-66) of letters written by Maria Knox to her mother, Mrs. Harriet Butler.
Provenance
Bequest of Gordon N. Ray, 1987.
Summary
Giving an account of her sister Anne's move from India back to England with her husband, Henry (Carmichael-Smyth) and Anne's reception at the family "Chateau" in Charlton by her in-laws; relating Anne's account of her son, the young W.M. Thackeray, with a description of his deeply affectionate nature, his delight in a recent visit to a camera obscura, reports from one of his teachers concerning his performance at school ("Dr. Turner says that he is one of the cleverest boys in the School ... but his idleness is unconquerable"), and his love of drawing ("he scribbles over every bit of paper he can find"); news of other family members in England, including her late sister Harriet Graham's orphan daughter Mary; expressing her longing to see her mother and reporting on her own household, her health, and a recent party she and husband hosted; describing various social engagements they have recently attended and recounting local news and gossip.
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