Miles Bowker Letters
CO48/41 National Archives, Kew, London ~ 1820 Settler Correspondence A-B
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197
Manor House, So. Newton, Wilton
July 18 1819
Honourable Sir,
Finding by a paper handed to me
yesterday by the Revd. Wm. Boscawen that it is the intention of His
Majesty's Government to countenance emigration to the Cape & being for
some time past determined with my family to take that step, I have to
beg you will do me the favour to inform what encouragement can be give
to a large family qualified by every practical operation to promote the
improvement of land and the welfare of such an establishment & the time
when the first opportunity will be given to proceed to the Colony.
By
constant application & industry in large concerns I have twice in my
life been worth fourteen thousand pounds or upwards and twice by
necessary political arrangements had that sum nearly annihilated,
presently upon a large farm here where I can make a living, but cannot
provide for a family of eight sons & one daughter without reducing them
to the lowest ranks in Society, which ill accords with the previous
knowledge of being descended from the first. We are unanimous in
this resolution & though it is not our intention immediately to leave
this situation yet we intend to so to divided the family that
whilst the one part is here drawing the business to such a conclusion as
will enable us to settle our concerns properly in this country, the
other part are ready to proceed in taking such steps as are found
fittest to make an attempt to provide for the whole in a distant
settlement.
As we consider ourselves so far respected by every class
of our neighbours as to be able to take out with us any number of able
husbandmen that we could think would be well employed & with which our
parish is at this time sadly over burthend, and as it is my wish
to keep a considerable Merion flock which I have been long accustomed to
which business particularly the aporting and scouring the wool I have
brought to a great perfection in the Spanish manner, I hope that a grant
of one thousand acres will not be considered too much for such an
undertaking, as this is even considerably less than I have been
accustomed to occupy for many years.
Originally largely concerned in
wholesale merchantile and manufacturing ingagements & well accustomed to
general business first in Northumberland, I would be proud to lend my
assistance in any way to promote the general views of His Majesty's
Ministers in this concern & if needed I could promptly satisfy them of
my ability & fitness for such employment. I have the honour to be
Honourable Sir
Your obedient and very able servant
Miles Bowker
35/236
London, July 24 1819
Bell
& Crown, Holborn
Honourable Sir,
Having yesterday the honour of receiving
your letter at So.Newton I have lost no time in waiting upon your
Lord, requesting informations on the following queries; I am
exceeding sorry to be thus troublesome, but well aware that many
great undertakings of this sort have come to an unhappy issue for
want of such circumspection, I trust the occasion will excuse the
enquirys & I will wait upon you, or attend now to be informed to how
the informations can be best procured & I have the honour to be
Honourable Sir
Your
most obedient hbl svt
Miles
BOWKER
261/262
So.Newton, Wilton, July 28 1819
Honourable Sir,
Deeply
impressed with the anxiety of a parent, I beg pardon for again
addressing you on the subject of emmigration, making free to
refer to two previous letters.
It will require a considerable
time for several familys so to settle their affairs as to be
ready to depart together & untill the busness is properly
explained I cannot make known my intention to such as I think
likely to undertake the expedition & consequently am anxious for
early information.
Few people I believe that have had the
respect shown them through a considerable part of life, that I
have had, will be likely to become partys here & if I may be
honord with any care for the welfare of such as may proceed with
or near me it seems right as communications by letter is
preferred to interview that you should be informed of my reasons
for hoping for such a consideration.
The inclosed letter
which I had the honour of addressing & writing to yourself &
every Member of the Senate which I prevailed on the East side of
the County of Dorset then in great distress to send rather than
petition by Publick Meeting & the voluntarily granting so great
a part of the prayer therin erased by the Minister & which
certainly saved a great part in that & many other quarters from
distruction, will sufficiently I hope explain my political
sentiments.
A letter which I lately wrote in answer to a
printed circular published by a very worthy magistrate in this
neiborhood recommending grants of land to the labouring
villager, shewing how it would increase rather than diminish
present distress & stating the only present easy relief that can
be afforded would give a good idea of my notions of District and
parish economy & which I believe hath satisfied the quarter of
the difficultys attending this proposed scheme. My proposal
chiefly being what has always been my own & my father’s
practice, to furnish a labourer gratis with potatoes, rather
than land, except 10 square lngs to a cottager for a garden, as
the best of these have not leisure to work them & a man cannot
serve two masters, this year I have salt for 55 familys in this
Parish nearly all gratis, 540 gallons of potatoes & I have no
fear of their being able to look a long winter in the face.
In all my adult time farming to a great extent I also for more
than 20 years as a child carried on and managed a manufactory
with success in Northumberland wherin I employed generally about
fifty familys & during that whole time & in fact during my whole
life, I never had occasion to go before a magistrate to help?
one single person & untill the unprincipled tyrany of Buonaparte
paralyzed our endeavour, though they did not ruin me, as I sold
my interest in the Works 9 years ago when I came south & they
are still carried on; I had always the comfort of seeing all
these people thrive. I have had the pleasure at the prayer of
the Parish of Great Canford Dorset to memorialise after viewing
their extensive farms & with success the present Lord Chancellor
in their behalf & thereby to relieve a most respectable sort of
farmer (without remuneration of any kind).
I had the honour
to be solicited by the farmers in Northumberland in company with
Mr. JOBSON of Turnlaws? & the late Mr. BAYLY of Chillingham to
petition Mr. PERCIVAL through the favour of the present Duke of
Northumberland to take their situation into consideration & I
represented the case to Mr. P from whom we had a kind &
ingenious though not favourable answer. I have long had the
honour of successfully arranging large farms & farming
conveniences & managing extensive manors & districts for my own
and wife’s friends & relations.
I have had the honour of
being introduced and taken to the Bath Agricultural Society by
my late Landlord Mr. DRAX-GROSVENOR as worthy of their society &
I am presently with my whole family employed with the utmost
care & industry in every part of the best approved modes of
practicable husbandry & looking upon Sir John SINCLAIR’s code
rather as one practice than our pattern; & at this time I am
parting with a young man who has been a year with me at one
hundred per anm for instruction in husbandry; remaining myself
open to conviction to correct my mistakes or adopt improvements
& may I add a constant practical Botanist which may be valuable
in an new country – yet conscious that nothing but an anxiety
for a sett of fine lads who have lived without occasion of
reproach can excuse this statement to which much might be added
& which I trust you will have the goodness to excuse & waiting
your answer I have the honour to be Honourable Sir your truly
obedient & very hbl servant
Miles BOWKER
403
Manor House, So.Newton, Salisbury
August 18 1819
Honourable Sir,
I am honoured by your
letter of the 16th instant & consider myself
greatly obliged thereby – finding it likely that you will
have a number of settlers & that it may not be convenient to
extend your invitation to an unlimited number I purpose
confining myself to ten individuals or familys to be
strictly regulated by the terms proposed by His Majesty’s
Government, on an early day you will have the goodness to
order information at what port & about what time in November
the vessels will be ready. The people that will accompany
that part of my family now intending to go will chiefly be
young married husbandmen & their wives &c. I have the honour
to be Honourable Sir
Your obedient & much obligd hbl
servant
Miles BOWKER
427/428
Manor House, So.Newton, Wilts
Aug 29 1819
Most Honourable Sir,
I was in hopes
that I had most explicitly declared my intention of
strictly conforming in every respect to the terms
specified in the circular letter in my last, which I
again here declare to be my purposed intentions; whilst
I am exceedingly gratefull to my Lord Bathurst and
yourself for the opportunity; & I make free to add that
I think it in every respect the best calculated attempt
to speedily establish a prosperous Colony that could be
immagined.
The other side contains the list of people
selected from our Township out of a multitude of
individuals left that would gladly have accompanied
their neibors. As my own family is so large I have
chiefly selected young able men of good characters to go
with us & without incumbrances whilst if other
descriptions of people were wanted they could still
easily be had. Chearfully then waiting our summons I
have the honour to be most honourable Sir
Your
obdeient & greatly oblgd & very hbl servant
Mile
BOWKER
[note at foot: Mr. BOWKER is a tenant of Lord PEMBROKE’s, who came here to speak about him]
List of
Miles BOWKER’s party purposing going to the Cape
Settlement
Miles BOWKER
54
Anna Maria BOWKER
35 his wife
John Mitford BOWKER
19 }
Wm.Monkhouse BOWKER
17 } brought up to agriculture & gardening with
good educations
Miles Brabin BOWKER
15 }
Thomas Holden BOWKER
13 }
Bertram Egerton BOWKER
11
Robert Mitford BOWKER
9
Septimus Bourchier BOWKER
7
Octavus Bourchier BOWKER
5
Mary Elizabeth BOWKER
2
Jane COOMS
18 servant girl
Bertram
MITFORD 28 farmer
Stephen
FORD 19 husbandman &
gardener
Isaac
BLAKE 19 do. & do.
Simon
BLAKE 20 do. &
shepherd
Reuben
BLAKE 19 do. & do.
Michael
MARSHALL 24 do. & shoemaker
Harriet
MARSHALL his wife 20
Do.
MARSHALL child 2
Sam’l
BLAKE 24 carter &
countryman
Honor
BLAKE his wife 25
Charles
BLAKE their child 1˝ yr old
579
So.Newton,
near Salisbury
Oct 4 1819
Honourable
Sir,
I have the honour of your letter
of the yesterday and on Wednesday a vestry meeting is to
be held when the business of the Emigrant Parishioners
will be settled and in a few days the lists will be
filled and forwarded with many gratefull thanks to my
Lord Bathurst and yourself.
May I make free to observe that greatly
interested in the welfare of this Colony I think it will
be of the utmost importance to the agricultural part of
it that land to be allotted to each family should be so
arranged that each should have their fair? share of
natural advantages – It has been necessarily the
practice in many divisions of Commons & Wastes of late
in this Kingdom perhaps on account of the multitude of
claimants, too much to divide these pieces into square
or nearly square portions, desorting? the beautiful,
picturesque and valuable practices of our Ancestors,
from remotest antiquity, making the new divisions more
like the portions of a backgammon board rather than the
naturally beautiful situations formerly established
around them & frequently by intercepting by crop fencing
banks the natural decent of the water, making ground
worse by the opperation that should have made an
improvement.
By recurring to any ancient division of
grounds you will observe that each proprietor’s limmits
was defined by the summit of each surrounding high
ground, as far as it was possible, that by descending
from thence each proprietor? and succeeding occupiers
might have the natural advantage of upland pasture,
middle ground for agricultural practices, pasturage and
residence & water and waterside lands. Succession as
near as was consistent with health and convenience,
dividing lands according to the natural declensions
would best accommodate with live? stock thereon, if not
at all times, yet so long as the season served, &
thereby opportunity to take advantage of the natural
deposits of water in such a way to make them valuable
for occasional supplies, or as in this neiborhood,
extensive irrigations, whilst the more distant and less
valuable parts were ? in wolds, wood, heaths or wilds?
for the improvement of future generations & the
convenience of supplying wood, firing.. as might be fitt
to appropriate to each for ? or district or otherways.
Much other valuable arrangement should be in
this state cautiously attended or unintentional
sufferings may take place which a little ? & experience
might avert. Proud to give every gratefull assistance
that can be afforded from extensive practice and
observation & have the honour to be Honourable Sir
Your very
obedient and gratefull humble servant
Miles
BOWKER
607
So.Newton, Oct 11 1819
Honourable
Sir,
I have the honour to inclose the
three lists of the party going out to the Cape with me
from hence, and I have concluded that it is likely to
answer the best purpose to accompany them at this time.
Leaving my eldest son and my wife & the remainder of my
family untill I return to them, or untilll they may have
properly settled our affairs here as circumstances may
prompt.
I want your further directions respecting
the payment of the head money & instructions to what
port & when to proceed & I have the honour to be RH Sir,
Your very
obedient and very humble servant
Miles
BOWKER
665
So.Newton, near Salisbury Oct 25 1819
Honourable
Sir,
Returning from a short absence I
had the honour of your favour respecting the head money
which I shall immediately set about raising and either
send it to Mr. HILL as directed or desire my Brother in
Law Mr. RENSHAW of Euston Place to call upon Mr. HILL
with it.
May I presume to desire the favour of being
informed as soon as convenient at what place this party
will be embarked & about what time as the different
individuals have little engagements to fulfill & sales
to make which they must accomplish at the last turn & I
have ordered some parcels from different manufactories
which are waiting for a proper address to save expence
of circuitous carring & I have the honour to be
Honourable Sir
Your very
obedient & greatly obligd humble servant
Miles
BOWKER
675
Manor House So. Newton Oct 31 1819
Honourable
Sir,
I am extremely sorry to have
given you occasion to write on the subject of the head
money expecting to have sent the form this time – always
proposing to keep the form for a part of my family which
settlement could be made I know the money for the
adventure could not come from hence but from my friend
in the north to which place the needful information is
sent & every post we expect the necessary amount which
shall be sent as the direction without delay & gratefull
for your ? and anxious for its accomplishment & I have
the honour to be Honourable Sir
Your very
obedient and very humble servant
Miles
BOWKER
682
So.Newton
Nov 8th
1819
Honourable
Sir,
Having unluckyly mislaid the
directions kindly sent to whence the Head money was to
be forwarded, for the settlers accompanying my young men
I make free to inclose the bill value 112.10s to
yourself and shall be proud of receiving your further
instructions and to have the honour to be, Honourable
Sir
Your very
obedient humble servant
Miles
BOWKER
698
So.Newton, Salisbury Nov 19 1819
Most Noble
Lord,
When the head money for the
party of settlers going out under my directions to the
Cape was sent to Mr.HILL he referred me to your Lordship
for further instructions.
Very gratefull for your great kindness to my
young men – I make free to say that my people are very
anxious to know from what place & about what time they
must be ready to proceed – which directions your
Lordship will be so good as order to be sent as soon as
needfull. I have the honour to be Most Noble Lord
Your very
obedient and very hbl servant
Miles
BOWKER
750/751
Gosport, Dec 14 1819
Right
Honourable Sir,
Having reported now
to Lieut. CHEESMAN that my list was unavoidable alterd
by accidents that could not be forevisited & their
placed filld by others of the same number, age & other
similar circumstances he informed me that it would be
necessary for me to send this information to you that a
correction of the list might be made properly, & I have
therefore made free to state the alterations on the
other side of this sheet & as they have been from
unavoidable casualties I hope there will be no
difficulty in the correction, Lieut. CHEESMAN’s polite
and friendly attention on this busness requires my
gratefull thanks. The vessel is to haul off on Monday
and then begin to load and he informs my family and
party must be now on Monday first at the latest. I have
the honour to be RH Sir
Your very
obedient and greatly obliged humble servant
Miles
BOWKER
People on
Mr.BOWKER’s list that are prevented from going to the
Cape
Mich.
MARSHALL shoemaker about 25 }
Wife about 24 }
his wife brought to bed and cannot go
Child 1˝
}
Mr. WARREN
husbandman 28 this man was my tenant but he is run off
and left his rent unpaid
Wife 25
W. WARREN
son 9
M. WARREN
daughter 5
Sa
WARREN do. 2
James SELF
weaver 50 gone to Trowbridge
People now
on M.BOWKER’s list in place of those gone
Anna Maria BOWKER,
my wife 35 years old
Bertram Egerton BOWKER
son 10
Robert Mitford BOWKER
8 yrs
Septimus BOWKER
6
Octavus BOWKER
4
Mary Elizabeth BOWKER
17m
Wm. INGRAM
joiner and countryman 24
Thos.
JOHNSON sawier 26
W. BOWLES
Labourer 17
As my
attention has been paid to keep the parties as near the
ages of the previous list as possible, & as Mrs. BOWKER
wishes to go with her children I hope party will be
considered better than before for the intend? purpose.
MB
751
Gosport, December 20 1819
Rt.Honourable Sir,
By direction of Lieut. CHEESMAN of this transport office I made free to note
the necessary alteration of names in the list of the
party going with me to the Cape, & this being the latest
day allowed for our being now in readiness, my part
arrived on Saturday & the old names on the list were
admitted on board the hulk untill the Weymouth is ready,
but untill your order for allowing the names that are
changed arrives they cannot be admitted on board &
consequently my family & three men are living at the Inn
here at a considerable expence to me, which I believe
was not intended, as the alteration has improved the
party in respectability as well as ability without
altering materially the ages & consequently promoting
better your intention. I am satisfied that your goodness
will as easily as possable do away with this unlucky
state of things by sending the corrected list to
Lieutenant CHEESMAN & I have the honour to be Rt.
Honourable Sir
Your
obedient and very hbl servant
Miles
BOWKER
755
Gosport December 23rd 1819
Rt.
Honourable Sir,
Lieut.CHEESMAN having no
directions respecting the changes in my list desires me
to inclose my old list with the names of the changes,
which I have made free to send inclosed, as he cannot
allow their embarkation untill that takes place & Capt.
TURNER has got his sailing orders. My distress on this
occasion must apologise for thus troubling you & your
goodness will relieve us by sending the corrected list
as soon as can be done. I have the honour to be Rt.
Honourable Sir
Your
obedient and much obliged humble servant.
Miles
BOWKER
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