OLD DOCUMENTS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume IV, Issue 223, 1 September 1936, Page 3

OLD DOCUMENTS.

I Connection With Sir Walter I Raleigh. A KNIGHT OF 1613. Many curious and interesting things are recalled by the old documents from Temple Newsam, near Leeds, which were sold at Sotheby's recently by order of Lord Halifax, says the News-Chronicle. He inherited the seyenteenth-century mansion of Temple Newsam from his aunt, the Hon. Mrs. Meynell Ingram, to whose husband it had descended from his grandmother, Elizabeth Ingram, daughter and co-heiress of Charles Ingram, tenth Viscount Irwin. The founder of the Ingram family was a certain Sir Arthur Ingi-am, a Yorkshireman, who made a fortune as a linendraper in London, wa_. knighted in 1613, and died.in 1642. He was a born speculator, often lent money to King James i, and was, moreover, extremely unscrupulous in his 'methods of business. His son was raised to the peerage in i 1661 as Viscount Ingram. It was Sir ! Arthur Ingram who acquired the Temple i News'am estate and built the existing house. A large number of the papers now to be sold date from his time and throw light upon his transactions. "Undoubtedly the most important of the Temple. Newsam papers," said Mr. C. des Grr.z, of Sotheby's, "are those which show Sir Arthur Ingram's connection with Sir Walter Raleigh's unfortunate last voyage. There is, for exam- I pie, a document, dated March 26, 1617, which is the equivalent to a share certificate in the undertaking. It is signed by Raleigh, and shows that Ingram innested £3;:0 in the expedition to America. What is especially curious is that there is also in the collection the document, dated April 28, 1618, by which Ingram transferred his interest in the venture to Richard Goldthorp, a relative of his mother's."

One is tempted to suspect that Sir Arthur may have received in London some information, not available to his cousin in Yorkshire, that things were going badly, and so hastened to sell out. Raleigh returned to England in June, 1618, and on October 29 was executed. "Any signature of Raleigh, or any document connected with him," continued Mr. des Graz, "is very rare and much sought after. These papers include five such documents, on one of which there is a fine seal. Sir Arthur Ingram knew everybody of note in lis day, and there is much interesting correspondence, especially a series of nine letters from the Earl of Strafford, vvhose autographs are extremely uncommon. "Another interesting section of the Temple Newsam papers centres round the rebellion of 1745. The Lord Irwin of the day took a leading part in organising ihe defence in the North of Eneland at that time. Such of his papers as have survived make up a miniature history of the local reaction of the rebellion."