Transcript – Unlocking the Archives

Document 45, p 3

upon the Bill was I conceived the proper moment for [risorting?] any
further Conditions & my Counsel were prepared to accede to such Terms
as should have been judged equitable. Thus much Sir I think it
right to say in my own Justification, if I have err’d it was not
intentionally, but be that as it may, when I found that a
Misunderstanding had arisen in Consequence of this Bill, I could
do no more than withdraw it, which was done accordingly, & I
doubt not I shall have no cause to repent that Measure, whether
the Bill would or would not have pass’d, the Majority of the
House must have determin’d, all I can say is, the withdrawing
it was entirely my own Act.
There is another part of this Transaction which I
never thought it would have been necessary for me to have said a
Syllable I mean the manner in which I executed my Engagements.
every one I thought was sufficiently concerned & I still think
there are few Exceptions, that no Attention, no Care, no Expence was
spar’d to render the Work not only substantial but beautiful, that
far from falling short of fulfilling my Contract I went greatly
beyond what I was bound by that Obligation to perform, that for the
Security of the Foundation I added to my original Design and
Estimate what occasioned an additional Expence amounting to
many Hundreds, and that upon the whole a much larger Sum
was expended than was receiv’d by me from the County; it was
my Pride Sir to execute this undertaking in the very best manner,
I disregarded the expence & ever felt myself above the Idea of
Pocketing the Public Money. After this Sir you will readily
believe I could not without much Surprize hear that some persons
had endeavor’d to impress you & the Public with an opinion
that I had not fulfilled my Contract, but what were the means
us’d to establish this Belief? Was Mr Smeaton produced to
declare that he had been stinted in the necessary Supplies of
cash, that his Designs had been ill executed from the Parsimony
of the Undertaker, or was Mr Pickernell your County Surveyor who

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Note: Letter from Mr Errington to Mr Aynsley, 22 September 1783, p 3

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Transcribed by CTW and KS