John Ryland, Bristol, to John Saffery, Salisbury, [Wednesday], 27 July 1808.
Dear Sir
Not being able to hear of any person coming to Salisbury, we think to send Betsey to Bath on Friday, & thence by the Bath Coach to Salisbury on Saturday Morning – A Studt will see her into the Coach, & we hope divine Goodness will convey her safely. Please to let her be met at the Coach – We have been to Plymth D. & my Wife is going up next week wth John who is about to settle in Business there. We unite in best Respects to yourself Mrs Saffery &c. Remember us to Miss Norton – I will write to her by Betsy and send you some Money – Excuse great haste – I am
Your cordl Bror
John Ryland
27 July 1808
We shall be glad to hear of Betsy’s safe arrival.
& wd be much obliged to Mrs Saffery if she could at the same time draw up a short Advertisement, as formerly proposed, to be put into the Evangl Magazine respecting a situation for Miss N.
Text: Saffery/Whitaker Papers, acc. 142, I.A.25.(a.), Angus Library, Regent's Park College, Oxford. Address: Revd Mr Saffery | Baptist Minister| Salisbury. For a complete annotated version of this letter, see Timothy Whelan, gen. ed., Nonconformist Women Writers, 1720-1840 (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2011), vol. 6, p. 272. Letter concerns Ryland's daughter, Elizabeth, who was a boarding student at Maria Saffery's school in Salisbury.