Smith, James

Submitted by edpope on

21.10.1801 Jas Smith breakfasts

I differ from the GD website, in the editorial notes on George Smith, where it is said that the main Smith of 1801 onwards was almost certainly a different person from the "Sunday breakfaster" of 1793-1796 (see Smith, George) on the grounds that the Smith from 1801 was more sociable and appeared at other venues, attended the theatre, and dined rather than breakfasted. But this could easily have been because his life had changed, as Godwin's life certainly had. In fact there were ony three theatre visits, one call on Perry, one on Nicholson & Northcote, one meal at Holcroft's, one at Fell's and one at Smith's own place with the Smith of 1801 to 1804. The rest of the hundred or so entries were calls or meals at Godwin's or calls by Godwin on Smith, and in the whole of 40 years after 1796 Godwin only noted about 100 breakfasts with anybody, less than the number he noted in 1793 to 1796 with Smith. The overall patterns of the 1793 to 1796 Smith, the 1801 to 1804 Smith and the Smith from 1810 oto 1821 seem to me to have been very similar. My guess that the Sunday breakfaster was a naval surgeon would explain the long gaps between these three periods, or there may have been another similar explanation such as Indian civil service. (However I have now fairly certainly identified the post 1810 James and Peter Smith, see below). There is also good reason to think that the 1801 to 1804 Smith was called James, like the post-1810 Smith, because on 21.10.1801 James Smith breakfasted, and after a long absence of Smiths (if we discount Charlotte Smith who almost always got at least her initial), Smith dined the next day and then appeared 15 more times in the next 40 days. This period ended when Smith called at one in the morning on 28.11.1801 and then the next day Godwin called on him for the first time, (perhaps to complain about the late call - or perhaps because Smith was about to return to France, see below), followed by more than three months when Smith didn't appear in the diary.

Before Smith's visits resumed on 17.3.1802, "George Smith & Fawcett call" on 12.2.1802. See Smith, farmer for Smiths previously linked with Fawcett. But Godwin's callers can only be presumed to have called together when the names are frequently linked, so this may have been a coincidence. This George Smith could have been the Sunday breakfaster, or another George Smith (see Smith, George). From 17.3.1802 to 15.3.1804 Smith was mostly calling on and dining with Godwin. The only calls on Smith were 12.8.1802, 21.9.1802 where Jas was specified, dine at Smith's 6.7.1802 after he had accompanied the whole Godwin family and the Marshalls to Greenwich, and call on Smith (£50 12 mos) on 18.2.1804. Presumably this was Godwin borrowing from Smith. (Smh at tea on 8.2.1804 should be added to Smith on GD website). The letters to and from Smith on 21.3.1804, 23.3.1804 and 27.3.1804 could have referred to the Smith Godwin had seen in Lewes when trying to rescue his niece Harriet from becoming a mistress (see Smith, Josias). Or they may have referred to the Smith he had been seeing, who had perhaps gone abroad or (as seems less likely to me) there may have been a falling out. On 2.10.1804 there was a call on Smith (not in) which could have been anyone, but more interestingly on 23.9.1805 "miss Jas Smith calls". The other Smiths from 1805 to 1810 can all be accounted for (see Smith, Charlotte / Topping / Smith, John (at Joseph Godwin's) / Smith, mrs P (at Rowan's) / Smith, Clara / Smith, Christopher / Smith, William / Smith, Thomas Jenyns / Smith, Edward / Smith, Sunday Review). then on 16.6.1810  "Jas Smith calls" followed the next day by "Jas & Peter & A Smith dine". Over the next two and a half years there were two more instances of James and Peter, three or four plural Smiths, plus twice Godwin saw Peter only, and 25 times J, Jas or James Smith and 21 times just Smith. Also one call on mrs J Smith on 7.5.1811.

The very first entry in Henry Crabb Robinson's diary dated 8.1.1811 referred to Charles Lamb's comments on a Smith they had met at Godwin's the 31st ult. The nearest Godwin's diary came to this was on 30.12.1810 when Smith and H Robinson were among the guests dining at Godwin's. Lamb was not in the list, and there were very few instances in Godwin's diary of Lamb and Smith appearing together. Anyway Lamb made fun of Smith for his taking things literally and said he was a Scotchman who had been a prisoner in France and was released thanks to his French wife who got access to Bonaparte.. From Lamb's comments I was able to identify the post-1810 James Smith as having been born in Glasgow about 1763. He had a son Peter born in Scotland around 1792 who became a clerk in the Colonial Office in 1810. James Smith's French wife was Louise Bourboulon born about 1773 and was his second wife and not the mother of Peter. Louise's father was Antoine (de Bonneuil) Bourboulon 1737-1800 a lawyer who was a clerk in the French finance ministry under Neckar, and who wrote a pamphlet in 1781 pointing out some of Neckar's mistakes and got royal protection, becoming secretary to the Comte D'Artois, and later bought the Hotel Ségur in the Place Vendôme. James & Louise Smith baptised a daughter Augustine Françoise in the Protestant chapel in Paris on 1.5.1805 two days after she was born, her godfather was John Hurford Stone DNB 1763-1818, and her father was described as a merchant born in "Dunbar Glascow". She was likely to have been the A Smith who dined with her father and half-brother at Godwin's on 17.6.1810. If so she was only five and would have probably met 8 year old Mary and 7 year old Claire. In 1812 J H Stone's printing and bookselling business in Paris went bankrupt, and a James Smith took it over, publishing various titles (see Library of Congress). After the 1830 revolution a James Smith was awarded the "July Medal". Louise Smith (probably the Mrs J Smith of Godwin's call on 7.5.1811) died 31.7.1833. I had thought James Smith married again, to Marie Catherine Quérat born 1811, repeating the ceremony (as Jacob Smith) on 6.5.1837 at St Pancras, however it turns out this was another James Smith, also a printer in Paris, who died on 6.9.1847 and was buried at the Cemetery of St Vincent at Montmartre, according to the gravestone in his 70th year, but according to Madeleine Stern in Biblioraphical Society of America vol 74 no 4 p 307 his death certificate ststes he was 68 and born in Norwich. Either of the James Smiths (but I suspect the Norwich one) could have been the one who took over Stone's business, the one who got.the medal, and the one involved in bringing the Diorama from Paris to London in 1824 and getting bankrupted there. I have recently received a lot of information about James Smith from one of his descendants and will probably have to revise this entry more thoroughly soon. He was clearly the James Smith "hammer man" who was married in 1790 at Gorbals, Glasgow to Agness Greig. Their son Peter was born at Gorbals in 1792 when James was described as a gunsmith, and in August 1793 he escaped to France rather than stand trial with John Mennons, a Glasgow printer, for a seditious advertisement in a Glasgow newspaper for an Association of the Sons of Liberty and the Friends of Man in Partick, then a village near Glasgow. He walked in 1818 from London to Milan and wrote a travel diary which is still preserved by his descendants. His daughter Augustine married on 18.6.1834 at Paris, Samuel Morlot de Wengy. James Smith died 5.3.1847 and was buried at the Old Cemetery at St Germain-en-Laye. Peter Smith became chief clerk in the Colonial Office and retired in 1860 after 50 years' service with C.B., K.C.G.B. after his name. He died unmarried on 1.3.1872 at a hotel in Montreux, Switzerland, his will was proved under £18,000 and his heir was Ulrikh Napoleon Morlot de Wengy, son of his half-sister Augustine (Newcastle Courant 15.3.1872).

21.11.1812 Peter Smith calls / 22.11.1812 write to Peter Smith / 16.2.1813 Jas Smith calls / 14.10.1813 again / 17.10.1813 again / 6.11.1813 P Smith calls / 23.11.1813 Jas Smith at Poole's / 6.12.1813 call on Jas Smith / 25.3.1814 Jas Smith calls (not in) / 19.4.1814 meet Peter Smith / 10.5.1814 Jas Smith calls (not in) / 18.5.1814 P Smith calls (not in) / 21.7.1814 Peter Smith calls / 19.6.1815 Jas Smith calls / 21.10.1817 Jas Smith calls (Godwins not in London) / 16.3.1819 call on P Smith / 24.3.1819 P Smith calls / 9.1.1821 Jas Smith adv at theatre / 2.4.1821 Jas Smith calls / 11.5.1821 Smiths dine / 18.4.1829 call on P Smith.

Arthur Smith who appeared in the diary some 60 times between 1830 and 1834 doesn't seem to have been related. From 1811 till Godwin's death, for the other Smiths in the diary see GD website for Horace (or Horatio) Smith, for Leonard Smith and for Dr Southwood Smith, and see my entries for Smith, organist / Smith, New Inn / Smith, Mary / Smith, Sophia / Smith, Frederick / Smith, artist / Smith, Long / Smith, Miss / Smith, Liverpool / Smith, printer / Smith, John (at Uwins') / Smith, William jr / Smith, Gower St / Smith, N S ).

My speculation above that the Smiths of 1793-1796, 1801-1805 and post 1810 were all the same is made unlikely if the first Smith was a surgeon as there is no reason to think the third one was ever a surgeon. I still think it's possible that all three Smiths were the same, or any two the same, or all three different. I've found very few mentions of Smith in Godwin's letters, but Bodleian Abinger c9 f33v dated 5.9.1805 Godwins to James Wollstonecraft said "we have heard no news of Smith whatever" this was just before Miss Jas Smith called. Abinger c43 f59 was perhaps from a Smith, or his wife, maybe to Godwin's wife, trying to effect a reconciliation between Godwin and Holcroft, which would place it between Feb 1805 and March 1809, a period when Godwin didn't see (James) Smith at all. It is hard to interpret as the writer appeared to refer to Smith in the 3rd person but then the context suggested that was a formal self-reference.

Smh 8.2.1804 and Smth 27.7.1810 probably belong to the one (or two) James Smiths, Peter Smth 18.6.1810 was clearly Peter Smith, and A Sm 9.6.1834, 8.11.1834 and 5.3.1835 clearly belonged to Arthur Smith. (None of these have been coded in the GD website)