Eliza Vowell, 133 Leadenhall Street, London, to Samuel Pearce, St. Pauls Square, Birmingham, 20 April 1799.

               I feel myself gratified in being permitted by Mr Maitland to enclose this Letter to Mr Pearce because it is an honor & pleasure I never expected to receive.  May it contain good news from abroad & convey fresh vigor to yr heart  the sincerest wish that swells mine, is that our kind father will speedily answer the innumerable prayers of yr Friends by raising you again to that Zenith of usefulness & glory in which you have so conspicuously shone—I have the additional pleasure of conveying a Letter from the same place to my dear Pastor Dr Rippon who sends his affectionate respects some time ago Mr Fuller told me if yr health permitted you might probably visit London, if this should be the case & you ever come into Leadenhall St. let me with intire sincerity assure you no one in London shall give you a heartier welcome than Mother & self if you will favor us so abundantly as to grant us any of yr Company—will you excuse this long Liberty from a young stranger who never the less will with the hope of yr permission style as well as feel herself Mr Pearce’s sincere friend.

                                                                                                                           Eliza Vowell

No. 133 Leadenhall St.

Text: Timothy Whelan, Baptist Autographs in the John Rylands University Library of Manchester, 1741-1845 (Macon: Mercer University Press, 2009), pp. ?? (annotated version); also Pearce Family Collection, MS. F. P. C. D55, Angus Library, Regent's Park College, Oxford.  Eliza Vowell, along with her grandfather, John Vowell, Sr., her father, John Vowell, Jr., and her mother, Sarah Vowell, were all stationers, first at Watling Street and then at 133 Leadenhall Street, 1745-1813. Vowell, Sr., turned the business over to his son in 1773, but remained active in the Court of Stationers until his death in 1801 at the age of 94.   Eliza's father, John Vowell, Jr., was deceased by 1792, for Sarah Vowell, most likely assisted by Eliza, operated the firm alone from 1792-1800; William Weare eventually joined Mrs. Vowell, taking over the business in 1808.  By 1805 Vowell and Weare had become the primary stationers to the East India Company. The Vowells were Baptists, attending the church at Carter Lane, Southwark, under John Rippon, one of the leading Baptist ministers of his day.  Eliza’s father subscribed to the Bristol Education Society, the fund-raising arm of Bristol Baptist College, in 1774.  Eliza Vowell officially joined Carter Lane on 7 April 1799, just a few months prior to the above letter.