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Document number: 01412
Date: 31 Mar 1826
Recipient: FEILDING Charles
Author: TALBOT William Henry Fox
Collection: British Library, London, Manuscripts - Fox Talbot Collection
Collection number historic: LA26-17
Last updated: 6th April 2014

Corfu
31st March 1826

My Dear Mr F.

Will you send me by the next packet (which sail regularly from Falmouth) 6 bottles of milk from Lawes’s in Regent St in a Hamper with 6 bottles of Essence of Coffee, & 6 pots of Pâte de Chocolate. All Lawes’s articles turned out well, except the Portable Soup, which did not keep so long as 3 weeks – The milk was opened on board ship – the 2d & 3d days when our stock of fresh milk was exhausted & voted to be excellent. Mixed with Coffee it was as good as milk can be, tho’ not good to be drank [sic] alone. – Other passengers on board the steamer were in number 20 masters, servants & children – We had a tiresome passage there being no accommodations on board, no beds, only sofas. Rainy weather continually rough sea. Passengers were a young officer, the new secretary to the Ionian Senate Mr Craufurd with his wife & 4 children,<1> Mr & Mrs Gordon,<2> & Col Mackaye. Mr Gorden is Mr Fazakerly’s<3> friend, the Gordon you must have heard of who is so eager for the Greeks – I have been dining with him today at Mr Forresti’s [sic]<4> a friend of his, to whom he introduced me, & who is a civil well informed man Everybody praises the Governor here,<5> & says he does all that is possible to spread rational liberty & improvement. The weather is very stormy, we had a gleam however at sunset today That was vy picturesque It fell upon the citadel which is vy abrupt and elevated, & displayed it against the sea & the Albanian Mountains of Ali Pacha’s<6> Country wrapped in clouds & gloom. We had a kid roasted whole at dinner today at Forresti’s, he treated us Homer does his heroes – He is loud in praise of Zante<7> & wants me to go there. He says in Sir Thos Maitland’s <8> time nobody durst open their mouths, & that all improvement was discouraged, but that now there is perfect freedom! –

Yours Affly
H. T.

Capt Feilding
31 Sackville Street
London


Notes:

1. See Doc. No: 01406.

2. Maj Gen Thomas Gordon (1788-1841), British army officer and historian, author of the History of the Greek revolution (London: T Cadell, 1832). He was not given a military title here as he was between military appointments at the time and was working on behalf of the London Committee to distribute funds raised in London in Greece. In 1827, he joined the Greek Army with rank of Brigadier.

3. John Nicholas Fazakerley (1787–1852), MP.

4. George Foresti (d 1836, the son of Spiridion Foresti (1752-1822), long time British Consul and Minister to the Ionian Islands. George held the position of British Consul to the Court of Ali Pasha at Ioannina in 1810-1813 and at the time of this letter was assisting the London Committee raising funds to support Greek Independence. Spiridion Foresti had a life long association with John Hawkins, FGS, FRHS, FRS (1761-1841), Cornish botanist and mining geologist and hosted him and Prof John Sibthorp (1758–1796), Oxford botanist, at Zante when they were collecting specimens for the lavish Flora Græca. John Sibthorp, John Hawkins, Ferdinand Bauer, James Edward Smith, John Lindley, Richard Taylor, John White; Flora Græca sive Plantarum rariorum historia quas in Provinciis aut insulis Graeciae legit, investigavit, et depingi curavit Johannes Sibthorp. Hic illic etiam insertae sunt pauculae species, quas vir idem clarissimus, Græciam versus navigans in itinere praesertim apud Italiam et Siciliam, invenerit (London: Richard Taylor and Co, 1806–1840).

5. Corfu was under British occupation from 1815 to 1864.

6. Ali Pasa Tepelenë (1744–1822), Albanian pasha, or provincial governor, of Janina from 1788.

7. The home island of George Foresti; also Zacynthus or Zakynthos, 3rd largest of the Ionian Islands of Greece.

8. Sir Thomas Maitland (1759–1824), 1st Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands and commander-in-chief in the Mediterranean.