Beschreibung:

Archive of manuscripts, ephemera and artefacts from the estate of David Garrick's widow, (Eva) Maria, and held by her executor the Revd Thomas Rackett comprising: (i) Accounts for musicians at Garrick's Drury Lane Theatre for the 1750-51 season, kept by the theatre's treasurer William Pritchard, signed and receipted by him in three places, opening on 8 September 1750 ("Began to Play September 8th 1750"), with the final receipt entered on 20 May 1751: entries in the main section made on a daily basis and listing each musician, their role and sum disbursed (as for example: "Mr Bennet 1st & 2nd Musick Romeo & Juliet/ Mr Lewis all Night – [£]2-3-4"), plus notes of the (all too frequent) occasions when the musicians were unable to perform because of illness; followed by a summary of "Nights Pay" and "Weekly Account of Forfiets for the Year 1750", 54 pages, usual dust-staining, etc., in a stationer's ruled account book, limp sheep, 8vo (ii) Catalogue of David Garrick's library of play quartos, from the early seventeenth to the early eighteenth century (with a few earlier), listing about a thousand quartos, opening: "A Woman a weather Cock a Comedy by nat field 1612/ Amende for Ladies a Comedy Ditto 1639/ Loves sacrifice a Tragedy by John forde -- -- 1633/ the Lover's melancholy a tragi-Comedy Ditto 1629/ the fancies by Ditto/ tis pity she's a whore 1633/ the Chronicle history of perkin warbeck -- -- 1634/ the Ladies tryal a tragi comedy by John forde – 1639/ the suns Darling a moral masque by John ford & thomas Decker -- - 1657/ Loves Labyrinth a tragi Comedy thomas forde -- -- 1660...", 77 pages, plus numerous blanks, in a ruled stationer's account book, browned, lacking covers, 8vo (iii) Transcripts of David Garrick's love-letters to his future wife, Eva Maria Veigel, comprising seven letters, beginning: "Madam/ As this is the first time I write to you..." and continuing until just after their marriage; with one additional letter of dismissal, possibly to a previous amour, the actress Susannah Cibber, 10 pages, on paper with watermark date 1822, in three bifolia, 4to (iv) Autograph wager signed by Garrick: "N.B the proof is upon Mr Home/ D Garrick", in response to John Home's bet: "A dinner for seven that Mr Barry is not engaged at Covent Garden before this date May the fourteenth 1774", on the reverse of a card addressed to Garrick by the Collector of the RSA, 1 page, oblong 8vo [Garrick lost the bet, his great rival Spranger Barry abandoning Drury Lane for Covent Garden at the end of the season; Mrs Barry's acting had been largely responsible for the success of Home's tragedy Alonzo earlier that year]; Two autograph box admission tickets signed by Garrick, (undivided, on one card); seven engraved box admission tickets, signed by Eva Maria (either as "M. Garrick" or "E.M. Garrick"), two dated 1800; autograph letter to David and Eva Maria Garrick bearing a self-portrait of the writer, "Mr Tycho"; an autograph letter to David Garrick by William de Chair Tattersall, son of the Rev James Tattersall, Rector of St Paul's, Covent Garden, writing on behalf of his father about the forthcoming Christmas festivities ("...wishing to settle a point, & then – drink a pint with him..."), bearing Garrick's autograph docket, Covent Garden, 26 December [1773] [see David Garrick Papers, Hereford Museum: 1992-24/9l]; Garrick's visiting-card (v) Shakespeare Jubilee: printed ephemera and effects pertaining to the Shakespeare Jubilee staged by Garrick at Stratford upon Avon in September 1769, including a steward's jubilee medal by Westwood of Birmingham, with part of the original rainbow ribbon attached; another example of the Shakespeare Jubilee ribbon (with note describing its origin); Garrick's broadsheet Ode Upon Dedicating a Building and Erecting a Statue to Shakespeare at Stratford Upon Avon (with the Testimonies, without half-title, in a separate gathering), 1769, with one missing line supplied in manuscript; and the Stratford printing of Boswe