COACHMAKING
Collection of 5 letters relating to coaches and coachmaking, including Autograph Letter Signed from Elizabeth Fox (1750-1842), 1½ pages 4to, St Anne's Hill, 12 January 1810. Also included are letters from coachmakers of the 1860s (one being Thrupp & Maberly, who were later known for their manufacturing of luxury car bodies such as Rolls Royce) and Metherall's price list of coachman's wigs.

'I mentioned to my Coachman yesterday that you were making me a new carriage and he said he hoped I had ordered Spring Box's to the wheels which he seems to think are excellent things, if therefore you have not ordered them and it is not now too late I shall be glad to have them. ...'

Elizabeth Fox (née Armitstead) was a legendary beauty who was at one time the mistress of the Prince of Wales (the future George IV) among other notable admirers. Her affair and ensuing marriage to the Whig politician Charles James Fox was kept secret for many years, but finally she was reluctantly accepted into upper circles of society. After Fox's death in 1806 she remained at their country estate St Anne's Hill in Surrey, surviving her husband by nearly thirty-six years.

£325 [No: 26505]