Letter – John Erasmus Blackett to Thomas Blackett – 25 Mar 1789

To Sir Thos Blackett Bart  Bretton                                                         NCastle  25th Mar 1789

                  near Wakefield  Yorkshire



Dear Sir	Your Lead Agents were with me the Last Week for subsistance for the Workmen, they gave me rather an unfavourable report of the state of your Lead Mines, the workings lately have failed, & at present it appears that there will not near the qty of Ore rais’d this Y[ea]r that has been the two or three last Y[ea]rs, however some of the working may improve, & I hope that the fresh trials that are making may Ans[wer], & make up for the deficiency in the other workings; the price of Lead at the London Markett is & has been for some Months past on the drop & as I mention’d in a former Lre [Letter] Messrs Lancaster & Co will be sufferors by the quanty that they have purchased of you in Octor last, great part of which is yet laying at Blaydon; I am now selling small parcells for exportation, & to Messrs Walker’s & Co for their white Lead works at £21-12-6 & £21-7-6 Litharge at £22 per Ton  I wish it may not be lower but am apprehensive that it will __ The Stewards are to be with me the 27th April for Money to make the several pays for the Lead Mines & Mills with subsistence for the workmen for the next 12 Mo[nth]s will amount to £55415-10 - 4 3/4  but £5221-16-9 of which Sum has been p[ai]d already at this place for Gunpowder, Iron, Ropes, Timber, Candles etc & I shall take with me £50193-13-7__The Collection for the poor of this Town was made & the <Frost break[e]d> up when I rec[eiv[ed your Lre [Letter], on w[hi]ch Acct I thought it unnecessary to subscribe any thing for you __ There has been a Riot amongst the Colliers in this Neighborhood, they did considerable damage to the Eastern Collieries, some of the Offenders were apprehended & committed to Goal, the rest are gone peaceable to Work.

	Mr Carr desires me to present his Comp[limen[ts to you & to inclose you a Bill for £27 the amount for the Cloth sent him [a]bating a few Shillings which he says that he shall not pay as there was more Cloth sent than he mention’d & one piece is not of the same colour that he desired.		 I am etc  J.E.B





£27 - -                                                                                 Newcastle Bank 27th March 1789

Forty Days after Date pay to the Order of John Erasmus Blackett

Esq Twenty seven pounds                                    Value recieved

                                                     For Sir J Eden Sir M W Ridley Cookson Widdrington & Co

To Messrs Castell Powell Sumner & Co                                                                                          Thos Gibson

      No 14249              London