Lacock
Monday 9 July
My Dear Hora
I am glad you and Ernestine <1> posed the other day – It will make a pretty tableau. I wish you could get some of the fashionable folk to patronise Nicole <2> – if they only bought one specimen each from him it would encourage him very much as he is afraid to advertize [sic] from the great expense –
I hope the Roman photographer who made the beautiful things which Caroline <3> sent me has not been killed by a stray ball or bomb – If he survives don’t you think he would be glad of an order sent to him to take some views of the scenes of Genl Oudinot’s <4> late operations? Tell Caroline we have settled to send Charles <5> to Mr Atwood’s <6> school after Christmas and ask her whether Charley <7> is not going there too? I know that Mr Atwood was going to write to her something about it.
Yr affte
Henry
Notes:
1. Ernestine Emma Horatia Edgcumbe (1843-1925), WHFT’s niece.
2. Nicolaas Henneman (1813–1898), Dutch, active in England; WHFT’s valet, then assistant; photographer.
3. Caroline Augusta Edgcumbe, née Feilding, Lady Mt Edgcumbe (1808–1881); WHFT’s half-sister.
4. Charles Nicolas Victor Oudinot, 2nd Duke of Reggio (1791–1863). He commanded the French expedition which captured Rome after the 1848 revolution and restored Pope Pius IX.
5. Charles Henry Talbot (1842–1916), antiquary & WHFT’s only son.
6. Rev Henry Adams Sergison Atwood (1800–1877), author.
7. Charles Earnest Edgcumbe (1838–1915), JP, WHFT’s nephew.