Papers of Various Members of the Grey Family

EGR4/10 contains the residue of personal papers of the Grey family, addressed to, or originally belonging to, several individuals in the first half of the nineteenth century: the daughters of the 5th Earl of Stamford, Lady Louisa Grey (1771-1830), Lady Sophia Grey (1777-1849), and Lady Amelia Grey (1779-1849), who married Sir John Lister Kaye; Elizabeth Chetwode, daughter of Lady Henrietta Grey (1764-1826), daughter of the 5th Earl of Stamford, and her husband Sir John Chetwode; Selina, Maria and Henrietta-Louisa Cotes, daughters of Lady Maria Grey (1769-1838), daughter of the 5th Earl of Stamford, and her husband John Cotes; Maria Glegg, daughter of Maria Cotes and her husband Major John Baskervyle Glegg; the daughters of the 6th Earl of Stamford, Lady Henrietta Charlotte Grey (1798-1866), who married Rev James Thomas Law, Lady Maria Grey (1800-21), and Lady Jane Grey (1804-77), who married Sir John Benn Walsh; Maria Leycester, cousin of Rev Harry Grey (1783-1860); and Frances Charlotte Elizabeth (b 1828), daughter of Rev Harry Grey.

The members of the Grey family who are represented in the papers include Hon Booth Grey (1740-1802), younger son of the 4th Earl of Stamford; his son Booth Grey esq (1783-1850); Henrietta Cavendish Grey (1737-1827), wife of the 5th Earl of Stamford; George Harry Grey (1765-1845), 6th Earl of Stamford, and his wife Henrietta Charlotte Elizabeth Grey (1773-1838); George Harry Grey (1802-35), eldest son of the 6th Earl of Stamford, and his wife Katherine Charteris; Henry Booth Grey (1807-57), younger son of the 6th Earl of Stamford; Rev Harry Grey (1783-1860); his son John Grey (1815-68); and Rev William Grey (1819-72) and his wife Harriet.

Papers of various members of the Grey family consist of the following items: correspondence relating to a contribution by Hon Booth Grey esq (1740-1802) to a Sunday school, 1786 (EGR4/10/1); a letter from Booth Grey (1783-1850) to Lady Sophia Grey (1777-1849), n.d. [1796x1800] (EGR4/10/2); a silhouette made by Lady Louisa Grey (1771-1830), n.d. [1802-3] (EGR4/10/3); an exercise book of Lady Maria Grey (1800-21), 1814 (EGR4/10/4); a letter from Henrietta Cavendish Grey (1737-1827), Countess of Stamford, to her granddaughter Henrietta-Louisa Cotes, 1815 (EGR4/10/5); a sample of embroidery sent by Henrietta Cavendish Grey (1737-1827), Countess of Stamford, to her granddaughter Miss Maria Cotes, n.d. [?1815] (EGR4/10/6); a bundle of letters to Lady Maria Grey (1800-21), 1820-1 (EGR4/10/7); a bundle of letters to Lady Jane Grey (1804-77), 1821 (EGR4/10/8); a bundle of letters to Lady Jane Grey (1804-77) from her brother George Harry Grey (1802-35) while he was on the Grand Tour, 1823-4 (EGR4/10/9); a bundle of letters to Lady Jane Walsh (1804-77), 1824-7 (EGR4/10/10); a letter from Harriet Inge to Lady Jane Walsh (1804-77), 1825 (EGR4/10/11); a letter from Henry Booth Grey (1807-57) to his sister Lady Jane Walsh (1804-77), 1825 (EGR4/10/12); a bundle of letters to Lady Henrietta Charlotte Law (1798-1866), 1819-33 (EGR4/10/13); an envelope of assorted papers belonging to Lady Henrietta Charlotte Law (1798-1866), 1825-53 (EGR4/10/14); a bundle of letters from Henrietta Cavendish Grey (1737-1827), Dowager Countess of Stamford, to her granddaughter Miss Selina Cotes, 1825-6 (EGR4/10/15); letters from Henrietta Cavendish Grey (1737-1827), Dowager Countess of Stamford, to her granddaughter Miss Elizabeth Chetwode and to her daughter Lady Amelia Kaye (1779-1849), 1826 (EGR4/10/16-17); a letter and a fragment of a wrapper from the 6th Earl of Stamford to his niece Maria Glegg, 1837 (EGR4/10/18-19); a letter from the 6th Earl of Stamford to (possibly) his niece Henrietta-Louisa Cotes, 1842 (EGR4/10/20); a letter from John Grey (1815-68) to Rev James Richey, 1843 (EGR4/10/21); a bundle of letters from Rev Harry Grey (1783-1860) to his cousin Maria Leycester, 1845-56 (EGR4/10/22); letters and fragments of letters from Rev William Grey (1819-72), his wife Harriet, and his father Rev Harry Grey (1783-1860) to Frances Charlotte Elizabeth Grey (b 1828), their sister and daughter respectively, 1850-1860 (EGR4/10/23-28); and an anonymous humorous letter, n.d. (EGR4/10/29).

The decision to treat the papers of the various members of the Grey family as a single sub-subfonds, rather than dividing them into separate sub-subfonds for each individual, was justified both on the grounds of expediency (given the large number of family members involved), and because it was impossible to reconstruct the provenance and history of many items, which appear to have been assembled as an artificial collection by the Earls of Stamford from diverse sources.

The majority of items were transferred to the John Rylands University Library of Manchester on 29 June 1990. Many of the items were found in two drawers of a cupboard in the Chintz Drawing Room at Dunham Massey Hall, the 6th drawer down on the left, labelled "Old family letters - Grey", and the 7th drawer down on the left, labelled "Letters Rev W. Grey, Harriet".

It is not known how or when the items in EGR4/10, which originally belonged to diverse branches of the Grey family, were returned to the ownership of the Earls of Stamford at Dunham Massey Hall.