| Description | Dear Friend,
There are few things that I wish more than your health and happiness, and therefore I wish you to avoid writeing more than is necessary, and consequently hope that any answer to this letter may be as brief as possible.
I am anxious to hear that the Cornish Metal Company have sent (and determine to keep [sending ]) considerable stocks of copper to Amsterdam and Hamburgh, with orders to sell at a certain price and not more or less, and that they have sent an intelligent person to every mine in Europe that can affect the markets at Amsterdam and Hamburgh, in order to learn at what price each can afford to deliver copper at those cities, of equal, superior, or inferior quality to the sorts which may be sent by the Cornish Metal Company. You won't forget that the shot copper from the English Copper Company is much better than any that ever came either to Turner's works or to our new brass works, and that the tile copper now selling here of the Duke of Devonshire's is the best (tile) that ever came to this market. You will remember my apprehensions about the quality of the copper when Mr. Wilson spoke of a price for smelting that the English Copper Company and Mr. Morris were surprized to hear; and unless some plan is settled to ascertain quality, I expect the smelters may take such advantage of the Cornish Metal Company as would produce very distressing consequences.
As the foreign sales consume so great a proportion of the whole copper that is and must be raised in Britain to support the present working mines, it is evidently prudent for such of them as cannot afford to sell copper as cheap as foreigners to provide for stopping with as little loss as possible; and the same principle will operate with foreigners when they see by the stocks deposited at Hamburgh and Amsterdam and the price the Cornish Metal Company can and will sell at.
This plan would certainly prove whether the copper now raising in Britain more than will be consumed or sold here can be sold at foreign markets at such a price as will support the present works. Untill this point is brought to a plain probable issue it would in my opinion be folly for our townsmen to embark in the trade upon the very extensive plan they propose.
By my letters from Carron per last post I find Mr. Gascoigne not only wrote for 600 ton of the best metal for casting cannon, but also for 20,000 fire bricks and 100 ton of fire clay, and for such machinery and utensils as will enable Russia to make cannon for all Europe; and upon the particulars of the sundry things Mr. Gascoigne desires may be sent him being laid before the Crown lawyers, they have given such an opinion thereon as will shew Messrs. Adam and Balfour how they may without penalty and punishment send him nearly the whole he desires, except only the 600 ton metal, and which they may also send by casting it into square plates or slobs in form of some manufacture, or suppose into little guns of about 1 C. weight or in the form of ballast for ships; and some such evasion I expect they will adopt, for Adam and Balfour are so much in Gascoigne's power that they dare not offend him. All this might be stopt by one line from Mr. Pitt to Carron Co. expressing his disapprobation of their sending to Russia, metal fit for casting cannon, fire brick, fire clay, or any machinery which they have reason to believe will be usefull to Mr. Gascoigne in his avowed design "to assist in the regulateing the foundery of guns in Russia."
Since you left home I have certain intelligence that many articles in hardware are establishing in Russia, and particularly cabinet furniture in brass-viz., handles and escutcheons, buckles and Bath-metal rings, various articles in metal silvered, many common steel articles, and different sorts of iron wares. And I have certain information that (Beldam) an eminent plater is gone to Paris from Sheffield. Several persons have been with me this week with accounts of many suspicious circumstances relative to workmen preparing to go abroad, and which renders it extremely difficult to determine what measures should be taken. To publish particulars cannot answer any good purpose as our laws now are, and I am very unwilling to go into any public discussion or to call a meeting of our Committee in your absence, tho' I am inexpressibly mortifyed by the daily notice I receive of attempts to transplant our manufactures into other states; and I don't see what we can do without the protection of administration, and to expect that seems ridiculous after the repeated important representations you and I made to Mr. Pitt and the Lords of Council, terminating in a mere talk; it is too foolish for us to throw our time away in such a manner. We must go to the minister with a considerable number of the nobility and principal gentry, who will attend to the preservation of our manufactures. Did you tell Mr. Pitt when you was in London? and if you did, I wish to know the outlines of what passed.
Mrs. Watt called of Miss Boulton and Mrs. Sarah Turner yesterday, and said that Mr. Watt had wrote he should be at home this week, but that his last letter did not say a word on the subject. She hath been to ask the refuse of Glover's house on Key Hill, and Mr. Startin has also applyed for it.
As Miss Boulton writes by this post, I shall only say she is quite well.
Remember me kindly to your son, and believe me with sincere affection, your gratefull friend,
Saml. Garbett
Mrs. Sarah Turner charged me to present her best respects to you. Pray do me the favour to give my compliments to Mr. Vivian and to Mr. Wilson.
[Edited transcript.] |