A Letter from the Hon. Thomas Hervey, to Sir Thomas…

“... beats everything for madness, horrid indecency, and folly and yet has some charming and striking passages”

A Letter from the Hon. Thomas Hervey, to Sir Thomas Hanmer, Bart. The Third Edition.

London : Printed for J. J. and sold by C. C. in Fleet-street, 1753. 8vo, [-]1, B-H4, I3, [2], 62 pp, disbound.
Hervey, described in DNB as an ‘eccentric pamphleteer’, in 1737 eloped with Elizabeth, second wife of his godfather, Thomas Hanmer. When she died in 1741 he published the present “Letter to Sir Thomas Hanmer”, notorious as a thoroughly scurrilous piece of work full of indescreet accusations. The experience of publication proved infectious and for the rest of his life he continued to publish on the theme of injustices suffered, either at the hands of his family or the courts.
In Horace Walpole's opinion Hervey's pamphleteering style ‘beats everything for madness, horrid indecency, and folly, and yet has some charming and striking passages’.

Stock No: HMF811
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