William Steele, Broughton, to Mary Steele, Yeovil, [Friday] 25 September 1772.

Broughton Sep. 25th 1772

   I duly rec’d my Dear Polly’s Letter of the 21st Inst: and truly sympathize with the tenderness of a Parent in the great distress the Loss of such an amiable Friend must occasion in her too sensibly feeling heart, but I beg My Dr you will not let your Sorrow be without hope but embrace that Consolation, which reflection on the superior happiness your much lov’d Friend now enjoys can give, and calm the anxiety of your mind by an ardent desire to pursue (thro’ Divine Grace) this same path to endless Felicity.  We heard the Melancholly News of Miss Ws death at Sarum Tuesday and then greatly fear’d it wou’d make a deep impression on your Mind.  O may the Consideration that neither Youth Beauty or Affluence can a moment suspend the uplifted hand of Death stir us up to a diligent preparation for the awful Moment.

   Your Aunt has not been so well for two or three days past as when I wrote last, has had a return of her fits, but is well enough to come down Stairs, the rest of the Family are all thro’ Mercy well & Mamma has rode out twice on your New Mare one of the times to Norman Court, Miss Ash with us on the other mare.  We have had a very tempestuous Night, some trees blown down & tiles from the House  I fear much damage is done at Sea. – I am glad your Uncle intends to come with you shall be glad of a Line by Saturday Nights post to know what day you will come. 

   I had heard before by Mr Rawlins of Mr Rippen’s flighty Manner of preaching; the Word you did not understand you may find in Baily’s 2nd Vol. under Vit: but I don’t know how he could introduce it under the Sense there given of it.

   I am glad you had such an agreeable Jaunt to Bridgwater & Taunton and hope you will have as pleasant a Journey to Broton where we much long to see you.

   We all join in compassionate regards for you under the present affecting dispensation and I am with every Paternal Wish for My Dr Girl, her ever affectionate Far

                                 Wm Steele

Due Service to yr Uncle

Text: Steele Collection, STE 4/5/xxi, Angus Library, Regent's Park College, Oxford. Postmark: Salisbury. Address: To / Miss Steele / at Mr Geo: Bullock’s / Yeovil / Somerset. For an annotated text of this letter, see Timothy Whelan, ed., Nonconformist Women Writers, 1720-1840, vol. 3, pp. 224-25. 

"Miss Ws death at Sarum" is a reference to the untimely death of a Miss Williams (‘Celia’), a girlhood friend of Mary Steele and Mary Scott, for which Steele composed an elegy and Scott included a short tribute to her in The Female Advocate (1774). Nathaniel Rawlings was the Baptist minister at Broughton, where the Steele's had long been ministers and members. John Rippon of Tiverton (1751-1836) was just completing his studies at Bristol Academy at the time of the above letter. He would soon become pastor of the Particular Baptist congregation at Carter Lane, Southwark, succeeding the legendary Particular Baptist minister and scholar, John Gill (1697-1771). The Universal Etymological English Dictionary (London, 1721) by Nathan Bailey (1691-1742) went through 22 editions by 1770. Bailey was a lexicographer and schoolmaster in London and for a time worshiped as a Seventh-day Baptist in the Mill Yard congregation in Goodman’s Fields, Whitechapel.