| Description | This file was probably begun by Matthew Boulton as a simple bundle, but its contents were later transferred to a portfolio. Under the arrangement made by M. R. Boulton about 1819, the portfolio was placed in Box I. II ("Special Correspondents"), and it was still in the same box when the Papers arrived at the Birmingham Assay Office in 1921. According to the inventory compiled by the Assay Office at that time the title of the portfolio was as follows:
cI Pascoe Grenfell From 1804 to 180-
But unfortunately it appears to have been discarded.
Within the portfolio, press-copy letters were, as usual, placed in separate packets, but the precise arrangement is unclear, for the yellow paper wrappers have been torn away (cf. 87. They may have been divided into annual packets, or it is possible that there was a division between copies of letters by Matthew Boulton and copies of letters by M. R. Boulton. For convenience sake, the draft letters have all been placed with the Copies, but it is probable that at least one of these (82) was originally with the Letters.
The original title of the portfolio suggests that the file did not originally extend beyond the year 1809; therefore it is possible that some of the later items now contained in it were transferred hither by the Assay Office. Four earlier letters from Grenfell will be found in Matthew Boulton's General Correspondence under the years 1790 and 1797.
Letters 1 and 79 have the year 1805 as a docket and it has been pointed out that internal evidence suggests that these two letters may perhaps have been misdated and should be read after nos. 21 and 89.
The summaries in quotations marks are taken from the contemporary dockets; those in square brackets are from the Assay Office Catalogue. The copy documents are press-copies, except where otherwise stated. |