6 Stratford Place
Oxford St. 31st Oct 1851
Sir.
I am directed by Lord Dudley Stuart<1> to acknowledge the receipt of your note of yesterday: and to say that pressing engagements, prevents his doing:
He has instructed me to inform you, that the request of Mr Henneman <2> has been laid before M Kossuth <3> who answered, that he should decline sitting to any Artists unless they were Hungarian, as he thought it was nothing but right, that his Countrymen should have the benefit, if any should accrue: On his Lordships representation that Mr Henneman’s was a particular branch of the art, in which there was little or no competition: M. Kossuth consented to sit to him, upon this understanding: that if any profit should result, from such sitting it should be given to the Hungarian Refugees.
I am Sir Your obt Servt
Jno: Kidd
H. F. Talbot Esq
Notes:
1. Lord Dudley Coutts Stuart (1803-1854), politician & advocate of Polish independence.
2. Nicolaas Henneman (1813-1898), Dutch, active in England; WHFT's valet, then assistant; photographer; opened calotype printing studio in Reading in 1843 and transferred to London in 1848.
3. Louis Kossuth / Lajos Kossuth (1802–1894) Hungarian Governor-President in exile and freedom fighter.