4 Eaton Place <1>
June 23d
My dear Sir
I am extremely concerned that it will not be in my Power to attend the County Meeting, <2> which you have summoned at Devizes on Friday next, in consequence of Business coming on in Parliament, which I think of too much Importance to allow me to be absent from my Place.
Cordially concurring as I do with the other Gentlemen who signed the Requisition to you, it would have been a great satisfaction to me, and I had fully reckoned on joining publicly with the rest of the County, in expressing our Horror and Indignation at the Traitorous Attack upon our Sovereign, <3> our Admiration of Her majesty’s Intrepidity at a moment of such Danger, and our gratitude to the Almighty for Her Preservation.
No one can feel these sentiments more deeply and sincerely than myself.
I remain my dear Sir yours very truly
T H S Sotheron.
The High Sherriff of Wilts &c
Notes:
1. London.
2. See for instance Doc. No: 04083, and Doc. No: 04093.
3. There were eight attempts on the life of Queen Victoria (1819–1901). This first attempt was by Edward Oxford in the early evening of 10th June 1840 shortly after the Queen and Prince Albert (1819–1861) left Buckingham Palace in their open carriage to visit the Queen’s mother, the Duchess of Kent, at her house in Belgrave Square. Oxford was only 18, the son of a jeweller. At his trial in July, he was found to be insane; he was therefore spared execution and committed to a lunatic asylum.