Lincoln’s Inn <1>
17th Oct 1856
Dear Sir
Henneman <2> has been here and I have talked over with him the means he will have of repaying the £36.10 in case of your advising it – he engages to repay it out of certain monies he expects to receive frm a Captn Mildmay <3> before his departure for India and a Mr Nicholson about to proceed to Egypt and other parties whom he has named who owe him money and at all counts to repay it before the 1st Jany next.
I do not consider this engagement at all “satisfactory” tho’ it is the best he can enter into and it is not unlikely that if adverse circes intervene his intentions may be intercepted – there is however no hostile appearance as yet from any quarter – Leslie talks of writing to You about his Gas apparatus but he has made no application to me – Henneman told him before the House was sold <4> (with my consent) that he might remove the fittings but he did not think proper to avail himself of it.
believe me to remain
My dear Sir
Yours very truly
J. H Bolton
I have admitted a Gentleman who served his articles to me & whom I have known from his infancy into partnership – his name is Filder – I hope it will not be long before You afford me the opportunity to introduce him personally. If I do not hear from You to the contrary I shall pay Higgs Solr the £36.10 and take a discharge in full, not letting them know that it is Your payments, <5> for otherwise You would be dunned by all the rest of H’s creditors.J. H B
Wm H. Fox Talbot Esqe
[envelope:]
Wm H. Fox Talbot Esqre
Lacock Abbey
Chippenham
Notes:
1. One of the four Inns of Court, the ‘colleges’ of barristers at the English Bar. Bolton had his chambers [lawyer’s offices and, at the time, living-quarters also] there.
2. Nicolaas Henneman (1813–1898), Dutch, active in England; WHFT’s valet, then assistant; photographer.
3. Perhaps Hervey George Mildmay (1817–82), Captain, R.N., son of Sir Henry St John Carew Mildmay and Anna Maria (née Wyndham Bouverie).
4. Probably Monument House, Kensal Green, where Henneman had a photographic printing business, which closed in 1856. See Doc. No: 07254 for Talbot’s financial support of this.
5. Talbot continued to support Henneman by secretly paying his debts.