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Document number: 05968
Date: Sun 27 Jun 1847
Recipient: TALBOT Constance, née Mundy
Author: TALBOT William Henry Fox
Collection: British Library, London, Manuscripts - Fox Talbot Collection
Collection number historic: LA47-58
Last updated: 14th March 2012

London
Sunday
27 June 1847

My Dear Constance

I have done all I can for Mr Kenrick. <1> I called on Ld Lansdowne <2> today & asked him for his interest – He said that if Dr Greenough <3> was a candidate he must give it to him, but that it was quite uncertain whether Melksham would be in the same district as Calne.

I think I must have missed one of your letters because in that of Friday you tell me that Ela <4> is better, [illegible deletion] but I had not heard previously of her being unwell, your letter of Sunday saying nothing about it.

I went to Oxford on Thursday afternoon after my return from North Wales, and left it on Saturday evening – But I intend to return there this evening, as we are to have a talk about Photography tomorrow in the Chemical Section <5> – I think of returning to Town again on Wednesday morning – Sir D. Brewster <6> is at Oxford, and a number of distinguished persons among whom is M. le Verrier <7> the French astronomer, and Mr Adams <8> of St John’s College Cambridge who advance rival claims to the new planet Neptune.

In haste Your afft
Henry

Please mention to Mr Kenrick what I have done for him or rather, endeavoured to do.–


Notes:

1. Dr George Cranmer Kenrick, surgeon living at The Grove, Melksham.

2. Henry Chas Keith Petty Fitzmaurice, 5th Marquess of Lansdowne; Earl of Shelburne (1845–1927).

3. George Bellas Greenough (1778-1855), geologist.

4. Ela Theresa Talbot (1835–1893), WHFT’s 1st daughter.

5. Of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, meeting in Oxford in June of 1847.

6. Sir David Brewster (1781–1868), Scottish scientist & journalist.

7. Urbain John Joseph Le Verrier (1811–1877) astronomer and chemist.

8. John Couch Adams (1819–1892), astronomer and mathematician. This was the first meeting of the two rival claimants to the discovery of Neptune. Adams had given the proper calculations to the head of the Cambridge Observatory, but these predictions remained unpublished until after those of Le Verrier.