| Description | The contents of this file were formerly in a portfolio entitled:
Westons Teasdale & Symes -. Weston 1821 to 1830
This is the title recorded in the Inventory made when the Matthew Boulton Papers arrived at the Assay Office in 1821, but unfortunately the portfolio was subsequently discarded. Under M. R. Boulton's arrangement the file was probably placed in Box K. I, where it was in 1921; it is not mentioned in the Inventory of the Study Safe. Note that there is a discrepancy between the dates of the title and those of the contents-probably the last digit was misread for an 8 [if the digit were correct, the file would be unusually small, containing only 33 items; moreover, there is no record of a separate file for the period from 1831 to 1838]; moreover, there is no evidence that the firm was ever known as Westons, Teesdale, & Symes, so this, too, may be a misreading. The single name Weston at the end of the title may have been intended to indicate the alteration of the firm's style to Teesdale, Weston, & Symes.
The copy letters were probably (as in other similar files) kept in a separate sequence at the end of the file, and that is the arrangement adopted here [under the arrangement adopted by the Assay Office, the press-copies were interspersed among the other letters. Note that the Copies are all docketed in red ink to distinguish them from the incoming letters and bills], viz.
Letters and Bills. (1-142)
Copies. (143-152)
In the Assay Office Catalogue, the bill of Wilson & Higgins (9) is described as having been contained in the packet of bills (21), but it does not appear to belong there. Likewise, the Catalogue notes that 50, 65, and 69 were formerly together in one packet, but there is no apparent reason why this should have been so.
In the following List, unless otherwise stated, the copy documents are press-copies. Nearly all the letters written by the firm at London are dated at Fenchurch Street and are marked "Private" on the address-label (in those cases where address-labels survive). Note that on several occasions the firm sent letters both to Messrs. Boulton, Watt, & Co. and to M. R. Boulton on the same day.
Between August 24th and November 21st, 1832, most of John Teesdale's letters were written on black-edged paper, in token of the death of John Mosley, Boulton's London agent, who died on August 15th in that year-and who, indeed, was the subject of many of the same letters. Likewise, the letters of John Coles Symes between October 21st, 1836, and March 24th, 1837, were on mourning paper, but the reason in this case is not clear. |