Memoir of John Murray
Augusta Leigh to John Murray, 1816
Six Mile Bottom, Newmarket.
Pray have the goodness to give me a line, when you can spare
one moment, to say whether you or anybody else of your acquaintance has heard
from my brother since I saw you, because I have not, and his silence of five
weeks being unusual, I am somewhat anxious. I shall be much obliged to you for
a book which I see advertised, the ‘Journal of the Duchesse
d’Angoulême.’ It sounds interesting, and Col. Leigh has a great wish to read it, or I
could wait until I return to town. If you can tell me any remarks upon the
Reviews, you know they can’t fail to be interesting.
Yours very sincerely,
P.S.—The post has brought me a letter from Byron—quite well; also one from
Mr. Davies; so I need not
trouble you with those queries. My brother writes to me about some trouble
with one of his servants, Fletcher,
and I believe it a matter of great difficulty.
Scrope Berdmore Davies (1782-1852)
Byron met his bosom friend while at Cambridge. Davies, a professional gambler, lent Byron
funds to pay for his travels in Greece and Byron acted as second in Davies' duels.
William Fletcher (1831 fl.)
Byron's valet, the son of a Newstead tenant; he continued in service to the end of the
poet's life, after which he was pensioned by the family. He married Anne Rood, formerly
maid to Augusta Leigh, and was living in London in 1831.
Hon. Augusta Mary Leigh [née Byron] (1783-1851)
Byron's half-sister; the daughter of Amelia Darcy, Baroness Conyers, she married
Lieutenant-Colonel George Leigh on 17 August 1807.
George Leigh (1771-1850)
Officer in the 10th Light Dragoons, gambler, and boon companion of the Prince of Wales;
he married Augusta Byron in 1807.