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Manuscript letter, dated 22 February, 1643, containing an Order of the Committee of Revenue to Thomas Fauconbridge, Receiver of Crown Revenues, to pay 'the poore Pewterers or Hammer men' of London the sum of £100, due to them by virtue of an Act of Parliament. The letter is signed by members of the Committee for Revenue, including Sir Henry Vane, Sir Henry Mildmay, Francis Rous, William Ashhurst, Thomas Hoyle and Dennis Bond. With a receipt dated 27 February 1643, bearing 56 signatures or marks and the signature of Robert Leeson, Warden of the Worshipful Company of Pewteres.

Engineering designs for Phillipe de la Hire of L'Academie Royale des Sciences, 1735.

John Urpeth Rastrick's surviving diaries and financial records, and other notebooks, 1805-1854.

Estimates in John Urpeth Rastrick's and another hand, usually endorsed and corrected by Rastrick, Dec 1843-Jul 1844.

Papers of John Urpeth Rastrick, 1800-1855, comprising a miscellany of correspondence (including drafts of copies of outgoing letters), with notes, engineering drawings, etc. Many of the notes and calculations are written in Rastrick's private cipher. Major correspondents include the London shipping iron merchants Henckell and Du Buisson; the 2nd Earl of Powis; John (later Sir John) Gladstone [father of W E Gladstone]; the lawyer, estate manager and politician James Loch and [?his son] George Loch; and Rastrick's sons and employees. Topics covered include the canal and railway interests of Rastrick and the other correspondents, as well as the iron industry. Most of the letters were dispatched to or from London or the industrial areas of South Wales and the West Midlands.

Manuscript 'Reasons for Mr. Hornblower's petitioning the Honourable House of Commons for an Act to extend the term of his patent', [24 Feb 1792]; the patent had been granted in 1781 for 14 years, permitting the use of his steam engine in the Cornish mines. The case of James Watt is cited: in 1774 he obtained an extension of a patent 'of a similar nature, for 25 years certain'.

Letter from Joseph Locke to [Isambard Kingdom Brunel], 14 Jul 1846. Arranging to meet Brunel and Robert Stephenson.

Autograph, with signature.

Letter from N Geary of Fareham, [Hampshire] to Mr Gunner, Waltham, Hampshire, 14 Jan 1815. Asking Gunner to remind the magistrates of the Droxford Bench that they were to inspect the public roads over the Forest of Bere, which Geary had made 'remarkably good'; but since 'the whole of the public money is expended, and the roads are getting bad', he asks the magistrates either to discharge him, or give 'assistance and support without which it will be impossible for me to proceed without much injury to the parishes, and disgrace to myself ...'.

Autograph, with signature. Some pencilled queries in another hand appear on the dorse, e.g. 'Does it lega[ll]y come before us?'