John Ryland, Jr., Northampton, to John Sutcliff, Olney, undated, but received on 26 January 1792.

Dear Bror

I have been wishing to write to you & have been hindered—I have not been nearer London than Luton[2] since I saw you at Northampton—My child was dangerously ill but thro mercy is recovered—I hear Mr Grunden[3] refus’d to visit Hunts followers here[4]—I sent 25 to each London bookseller[5]—know not how I had best send to Sheffield—I gave prests to Hervey,[6] Forsaith,[7] Evans,[8] Okely,[9] Edwd Scott, Newton, Rippon, Booth,[10] Thomas,[11] Pearce, Mr Sprig sen.r [12] Dr Williams,[13] Dr Edw.[14] Dr Stillman—[15]

You must fight your Antinoms by fasting and prayer. God is doing great things in Guilsboro, & a Revival seems beginning at Clipston by this means, they have begun at Leicester—and we had a good Meeting last Wed. fm 8 till 2. Bror Edmd[16] and his people are all alive indeed—You do owe me for Stratford serms—Bror Fuller I believe pretty well—Hunts folks have had one Hoxton or Hodgson or some [paper torn] name down—He explained the 4 Judgments threaten’d to the [paper torn] Famine Sword Pestilence Evil Beasts—” Now I’ll show you a Mystery—The Sword means the Law—Evil Beasts false Teachers &c.” They have met 2 Sabbaths by themselves for prayer & Reading—None yet have joined them that we account a loss to us—

I sent 13 Serms to Leicester—Shd have exchanged wth Faukner[17] last Lords Day or next but both times put off—Shall not go now I suppose—probably may change with Bror [Eden?] next L. day & night—Excuse great haste—We write in Love to you All—I owe you for the Charity School Girl Acct 5/6—Did—yes I did shew you Jones’s Good News from Wales[18]—Can you do poor [Motick?] one good yet—I want you to have another Letter from Botsford.[19] I am 

                                             Yrs cordially

                                                                        John Ryland Jun.

On the back page Sutcliff has added: 

Recd with this

1 Edws on Redemp.[20]                  3s6d

2 Flemming versified at             6s1d

Text: Timothy Whelan, Baptist Autographs in the John Rylands University Library of Manchester, 1741-1845 (Macon: Mercer University Press, 2009), pp. 56-58 (annotated version); also Eng. MS. 371, fol. 107d, John Rylands University Library of Manchester. Ryland preached at Luton on Wednesday, 4 January 1792 (see “Text Book John Ryland, D. D. 1766-1825,” MS., Northamptonshire Record Office, MS. CSB, n.p.). Richard Grinden (Grindon) was the Baptist minister at Sharnbrook. William Huntington (1745-1813) was a controversial High Calvinist preacher in London with whom Ryland had many disagreements.  Others mentioned above include Thomas Hervey (1741-1806), Anglican evangelical clergyman; Robert Forsaith (1749-97), Independent minister in Northampton; John Evans, Baptist minister in Foxton, Northamptonshire; Francis Okely (1719-94, Moravian minister; Abraham Booth (1734-1806), Baptist minister at Little Prescot Street, Goodman’s Fields, London; Edward Williams (1750-1813), at that time minister at Carrs Lane Independent church, Birmingham; Dr. Jonathan Edwards (1745-1801), son of the famous leader of the American Great Awakening; Samuel Stillman (1737-1807), minister of the First Baptist Church in Boston, 1765-1805; John Edmonds, Baptist minister at Guilsborough, 1781-c.1811; Robert Faulkner, Baptist minister at Thorn; and David Jones (1741-92), Baptist minister at Pontypool in Wales.