Add MS 39852

FROBISHER'S VOYAGES: a transcript of the accompts of Michael Lok, Governor and Treasurer of the Company of Cathay, and others, relating to Martin Frobisher's three voyages in search of a North-West passage in 1576, 1577 and 1578. The original MS., now in two volumes at the Public Record Office, numbered Misc. Books (Exchr. K.R.), vols. 35, 36, was formerly in the King's Remembrancer's Office, King's Mews, Charing Cross, and was then described in Proc. of H.M. Commissioners on Public Records, 1832-1833 (ed. C. P. Cooper, 1833), pp. 74-77, 558-562. The present copy was made, circ. 1821-1824, for Craven Ord, F.R.S., F.S.A., when Secondary in that office (ff. 5-13, 88-92 and a few pencil notes are in his hand) ; its arrangement differs considerably from the Record Office volumes. At ff. 230-235 is inserted a report (dated 21 Mar. 1579/80) on the roasting at Queenborough and smelting at Dartford, co. Kent, of copper and lead ore sent from Keswick, co. Cumb., by Daniel Heghstetter [al. Höchstetter], the latter process being probably carried out in furnaces belonging to the Cathay Company. For the Keswick mines see W. G. Collingwood, Elizabethan Keswick (Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian Soc.), 1912. The accompts are preceded (ff. 1-13) by collections respecting Frobisher by Ord, including (f. 4) a release by Frobislier (" M. Frobysher " at the foot is not a signature) and Dorothy, his wife, executrix of the will of Powle Wythypoll, deceased, to Bassingborne and Philip Gawdy, of West Harling, co. Norf., of all claims concerning Wythypoll's estate, 19 Oct. 1590. Paper (watermarks 1821-1824) ; ff. i + 249. Folio. XIX cent. Bought at the sale of the last portion of Ord's library (sale-cat., 12 May 1832, lot 1050) by Thomas Thorpe, the bookseller (catalogues, 1835, no. 267, 1836, no. 906), and sold, in 1836, to Sir Thomas Phillips. Phillips MS. 8721 (sale-cat., 24 June 1919, lot 154). Lot 155 in the same sale was apparently the original (detached from the MS. now in the Record Office before this transcript was made) detailed accompt by Lok of the third voyage.