HISTORIC MSS.

Greymouth Evening Star, 3 September 1938, Page 11

HISTORIC MSS.

PAYMENTS TO NELL GWYNN. LONDON, July 18. Unique historic documents are among the archives in the library of the Custom House, Lower Thames Street, which will be moved next month to new quarters. More than 30,000 books and tens of thousands of documents are to be transferred to a more spacious room in the same building. Among the documents is a TreasuryWarrant Book-of the year 1683. This shows that payments of £250 were made every fortnight to Nell Gwynn. She is variously referred to in the book as “Mrs ; Gwynn” and “Airs Nelly.” King Charles’s illegitimate children, among whom are the Duke- of Grafton, the Duke of Monmouth, the Duke of Southampton, the Earl of Lichfield and the Earl of Sussex, are also listed as receiving amounts varying from £350 to £7OO. A document which arouses the covetousness of American visitors bears the only known signatures of Paul Jones, America’s national hero, in his real name of John Paul. They appear on a ship’s manifest dated December, 1770. Paul was still at that time a British sea captain. Robert Burns was at one lime an exciseman, a “gauger,” in Dumfries, measuring the amount of beer in the neighbourhood for taxation. A report on his character remarks: “The Poet docs pretty well.” There is a signature of William Prynne, the pamphleteer, who had his ears cut off for publishing a libel on Queen Henrietta Maria. Later he became Commissioner for Collecting Arrears of Excise, and his signature receipts an amount of £25, one quarters salary. Of great historic value is a letter signed “S. Pepys.” Dated Oct. 22, 1685. it enjoins an embago on outwardbound “Shipps and Vessells,” except “such Vessells as shall be employed in our immediate service.”

The oldest document, dated 1507, is a list of paid Civil Servants. Allusion is made to a “river season ticket” used by a Customs officer, who charges £1 13/4 for “bote hire.” > The library and its documents are open to the inspection of students by special appointment.

NELL GWYNN PICTURE. WINDSOR, July 18. A portrait of Nell Gwynn painted on glass has been discovered concealed in the bedroom wall of a house opposite Windsor Castle, which was built for her by Charles 11. The house is being modernised, and workmen, wiring it for electric light, found the picture bricked in a wall behind some oak panelling. It is stated to he a splendid portrait of “The Orange Girl.” and in a good state of preservation. It measures Sin by Bin. Mr Letts, who recently acquired tht' house, is sending it to experts.