A letter addressed to Sir John Bernard Burke, Ulster King-of-Arms of All Ireland : with an appendix of documents and notes.

  • Thomas Wharton Jones
Date:
1867]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A letter addressed to Sir John Bernard Burke, Ulster King-of-Arms of All Ireland : with an appendix of documents and notes. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    One of the Witnesses to the signature of Kichard Harris is a James Wliatman. This, it may be presumed—nay, it is probable — was the same James Whatman ndio married JMrs. Ann Harris, the Eelict of Eichard Harris, and thus succeeded to both the Bed and the Mill of that individual. The marriage of James Whatman with the Widow of Eichard Harris, Paper Maher-, was contracted some time in 1740. I have not discovered the record of it (Appendix IV.) ; but as James, a son of the marriage, v as baptized at Boxley, August 25, 1741 (Appendix V.), the marriage may haA-e taken place about the end of October or beginning of November, 1740; that is, about seven months after the probable date of the death of Eichard Harris, Mrs. Ann Wliatman’s first husband. James Whatman, who, by this marriage, came into Eichard Harris’ property, rvas tlie only son of James Whatman of Loose, near Maidstone, Tanner, who died in 1725 (Appendix VI.), and hi^wife Mary, who died in 1726. In Hasted’s ‘ History of Kent,’ it is, as already observed, erroneously stated that “ Mr. Gill sold the Turkey Mills to Mr. James Whatman, who in 1739 pulled the whole of them doAvn and began to erect them on a much more curious and extensive plan,” &c. Eichard Harris and his proprietorship of the Boxley paper mills were here entirely ignored. But a more remarkable omission is made in the 'Wliatman pedigree ; for it is there put down that James Whatman, in 1740, married “ IMrs. A.nn Harris,” without any mention of her being the Eelict of Eichard Harris, or even that she was a Widow at all. For anything that is said to the contrary, “ ]\Irs. Ann Harris ’’ might have been a Spinster ; young ladies in those days fre-