Add MS 42153

THE KNYVETT LETTERS: eighty-eight letters from Thomas Knyvett, of Ashwellthorpe, co. Norf. (1596-1658), de jure 5th Lord Berners, addressed to his wife Katherine, daughter of Thomas Burgh, 5th Baron Burgh of Gainsborough; 18 Ma[rch] 162.0/[1]-11 July 1644 and n. d. Knyvett was taken prisoner during the Royalist rising at Lowestoft in March 1643, and most of the later letters refer, in addition to contemporary events, to his efforts to obtain the release of his estates from sequestration. Edited in full by B. Schofield, The Knyvett Letters, 1949 (Norfolk Record Society, XX, and Constable and Co.). Extracts from the letters appeared in The Times, 2-5 Feb. 1931; cf. also Brit. Mus. Quart., v, 1930-1931, pp. 115-116. At the end of the volume are:-(a) Declaration by Knyvett of his fidelity to the Parliament during the preceding five years, 3 Dec. 1655 (Schofield, op. cit., p. 47, n. 3). f. 169;-(b) Draft of a petition by Knyvett to Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector, circ. 1656 (Schofield, op. cit., p. 48). f. 170;-(c) Photographs of a letter from Oliver Cromwell, to Knyvett, concerning the latter's tenants at Hapton, 27 July 1646 (Oliver Cromwell's letters and speeches, with elucidations, ed. S. C. Lomas, 1904, i, p. 237), the original of which was preserved with the present letters until 1930, after which it was sold separately at Sotheby's, 17 Feb. 1931, lot 415 (and again at Sotheby's, 4 July 1955, lot 845). ff. 171, 172. For other papers of the Knyvett family see Add. MSS. 27395-27400 and Egerton MSS. 2713-2722, and 2804 passim. Paper; ff. 172. Folio. A.D. 1620-1644. For the history of the letters see Schofield, op. cit., p. 13.