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Document number: 02088
Date: Tue 30 Nov 1830
Recipient: TALBOT William Henry Fox
Author: FEILDING Elisabeth Theresa, née Fox Strangways
Collection: British Library, London, Manuscripts - Fox Talbot Collection
Collection number historic: LA30-050
Last updated: 1st September 2003

Tuesday 30th Novr

My dear Henry

Thank you for writing every day to quiet my mind. We have better accounts from Melbury <1> this morning, John <2> writes word the insurgents <3> have not advanced nearer than Minterne, and Melbury is well garrisoned with servants armed & constables, my Brother <4> shewing himself everywhere about, that they may not think he is intimidated, as it was reported he had gone to London with his Children, which he took every pains to contradict. I saw Mr Baring Wall <5> last Night at a Party at Miss Berry’s. They have burnt him in effigy at his place at Norman Court in the South of Wiltshire, and he told me he was so surprised for he thought himself so beloved, & so popular! But he said it would recoil upon themselves for instead of spending half the year the<re> and diffusing money amongst them he should for the future live always in London, and he thought it would be the case with many. He said he had not patience to hear people here who know nothing of the country, talk as they do, & say it is so easy to do this, & so easy to do that, but those who really know must confess there never was any thing more difficult or more complicated. The accounts from Moreton <6> to day are not better, they hear the mobs are advancing & they remain with their windows on the ground floor double barred with strong iron & all the Sofas & Chairs piled up against them, as they have heard the house is to be forced. a friend of Mr Frampton’s <7> overheard this resolution in the Market place at Bere, & rode over to tell him. They have above 100 scouts in different directions on Moreton Heath to give notice of approach, & twelve soldiers in the house & plenty of ammunition. Harriot <8> herself says she shall take refuge in the roof, but I should not think that is a good place, for fear they should take it into their heads to set it on fire. The worst of it is that one does not see where it is to end, they cannot live always in a garrisoned state, & then what security have they against these people who have vowed vengeance. His own people are very contented & well off, and it is hard to be molested by those at a distance, at the same time as all the other landlords in Dorset have given in, one does not see what can be the result of his resistance however justifiable. Mr Portman <9> who had conceded at first, has had some of the same people return to claim higher wages, having got them raised as they think so easily. Nobody talks of any thing else, tho’ some laugh & some treat it tragically. Sometimes I think of sending you down the Times, <10> not withstanding you have I know the Courier & Morning Chronicle. <11> There is a great deal in all the Papers but especially in the Times which had better not be read in the village abusing Landlords & saying numberless calumnies of them. So dont let it go out of your hands.

I send the Times of to day that you may see Lord Gage’s <12> Explanation about which so much has been said & other interesting things

don’t leave it about

London <13> November thirty 1830 C R M Talbot <14>
W. H. F. Talbot Esqre
Laycock Abbey
Chippenham


Notes:

1. Melbury, Dorset: one of the Fox Strangways family homes; WHFT was born there.

2. John George Charles Fox Strangways (1803–1859), MP.

3. This refers to the ‘Swing Riots’ due to the signature of a mythical Captain Swing which appeared at the bottom of a number of threatening letters written at the time and were prompted by a decline in the prices of agricultural produce and wages. Hundred of rioters destroyed new threshing machines, which they felt were taking away their winter work and they put pressure on the church to reduce the amount in tithes it took from the farmers. [See Doc. No: 02083].

4. Probably Henry Stephen Fox Strangways, 3rd Earl of Ilchester (1787–1858).

5. Probably Charles Baring Wall (1795–1853), MP for Guildford.

6. Moreton, Dorset: home of the Frampton family.

7. James Frampton (1769–1855), High Sheriff.

8. Probably Lady Harriet Frampton, née Fox Strangways (d. 1844) .

9. Edward Berkeley Portman, Viscount Portman (1799–1888). As a liberal he sat for Dorset from 1823 to 1832.

10. The Times (London).

11. Morning Chronicle.

12. Probably Henry Hall Gage, 4th Viscount Gage (1791–1877).

13. Address panel written in another hand.

14. Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot (1803–1890), immensely wealthy landowner, mathematician & politician; WHFT’s Welsh cousin.