Letter from John Hennon Hackworth, Chichester to Samuel Holmes

18 North Pallant, Chichester 1st Dec 1919
My dear Sam
In the absence of any reply from you to my last letter I wrote to Mrs Balfour-Murphy (ii) asking for your present address, to which she replied that you received my letter & that you returned home on 22nd Oct, which was a very great disappointment to me, as I had looked forward to seeing you with much pleasure especially as you had promised to look me up on your further trip. I hope you have arrived there safely, after what must have been a delightful holiday. I trusted you benefitted thereby & are both in your usually splendid health & thinking over our correspondence ten years ago, when you so generously sent me ten pounds. I remember you expressing ‘surprise’ at my financial position. I suppose in one way I should take that as a compliment, but if you had thought of the persistent & tragical (sic) ill luck & misfortunes that have followed every member of the Hackworth family for nearly a century you would have felt no surprise at my position. Permit me to refresh your memory with a brief account of our family disasters. Beginning with your Grandfather, & my uncle, Timothy (iii),
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whose fertile brain & inventive genius made him ‘The Father of the Locomotive Engine’, which would have ensured him a tidy fortune & made his name famous for ever. Instead of which, a dirty robber stole everything from him & ruined the splendid harvest sown by Timothy Hackworth. Then came his son John Wesley (iv), dogged by misfortune all his life! After years of hard work he had just got his new works completed at Bank Top & built up a prosperous trade with Egypt, got his works full of plain flour & other specialities for that market, when the Khedive fell and with him all Cousin Johns (sic) friends there. Result utter ruin! Thereafter for some years he became a Consulting Engineer. His inventive genius always at work principally on his steam valve gear. At last he perfected his ‘Dynamic Gear’ to his great joy & in the point of securing his patent he unfortunately went to Stockton and called upon a small engineer George Clough. There happened to be present a certain David Joy, a dirty mean. sneaking thief. Full of excitement, but incredibly incautious, Cousin John told them of his invention. Result: David Joy went to London that day & patented the invention in his own name & made
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a pile out of it!
Next Cousin Albert (v), the only real worker of their family. Married & with a young family, in a good position, suddenly struck blind!
Then take my dear father (vi). After a life time of hard work to discover his partner Fossick & his manager Blair had been systematically and cunningly robbing him, leaving him in his old age without a meagre income. As for myself, I have often regretted I did not accept your suggestion & gone out to join you in New York. Instead of which I left the sea & ran an agency for Mesrs J & F Howard Be……… for their Patent Safety Tubular Steam Boiler. My district as Sole Agent was London & Home counties & Export. For a few years this went well. I had nearly 300 boilers in my ground & a staff of men always engaged in erection and repairs. Then unfortunately the patent was sold to the Burrow Shipbuilding Co & worse luck David Joy was made manager (sic) the department which proved fatal to the boiler, & his so called improvements absolutely failed & the sales steadily decreased. Now Joy began to systematically
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annoy me & put obstacles in my way for which I could not account. So in despair I resigned. Instantly I discovered Joys (sic) motive, for he at once obtained my position. But at the end of a year was discharged & I was invited back. But Joy had killed the trade & it died after 16 years of chequered existence.
So you see Joy brought grief & loss into the lives of two John Hackworths.
Our only serious competitors were the Babcock & Wilcox tubular boilers……… claims in ……… business everywhere. Came from your side of pond (sic). My general business of agent & ………………………………… & Mach. Tools merchant was at one time fairly good, especially export. But eventually & surely the middle man’s positon became more and more insecure. The manufacturers no longer backed up the middle man & began to establish their own offices everywhere & Buyers insisted in buying direct. Even Japan where I had done a big business. Finally lack of capital to continue the project compelled me to make an arrangement with my creditors after a hard struggle for 20 years! I should have recognised the inevitable years before & got into something else after scrapping everything after the American sensible plan.
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Foolishly I brought up my son (vii) in my own business & the war & 4 years absence ruined him, as I told you in my last letter. His operation took place three weeks ago & proved a very serious one but with his splendid constitution he is making a satisfactory recovery. It will however be three months before he is fit to tackle business seriously, so he needs assistance poor boy. No doubt you were aware of most of the family disasters herein roughly detailed, but some of it will be new to you, so you will now perhaps not be so ‘surprised’ at my position ten years ago.
I was glad to note by your interesting letter of last March that so many of your relatives have done well & I am more than glad to assume that you have done well under the Stars & Stripes & that at your age you are so fit as to be able to go to the City almost daily. Accept my sincere congratulations old boy & may you long live to enjoy their blessings. I hope I have not wearied you with my long yarn, which you may find time to read at your leisure over your last pipe.
My dear wife (vii) is better, thank God, but I have a wretched cold, so am keeping indoors for a day or two. At 76 we must be careful. I shall be glad to receive one of your cheery letters when you have time or inclination. With every good wish to you &
Then written up the left side of the page
your dear wife (viii) & wishing you all the compliments of the coming festive season. Tom Tom tells me the last flogging he had at Cooks school was for playing tyrant with Jim Bowran & you for fishing at Portrack Lake. . Yours affectionately . John H. Hackworth.
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Dear S. Just a short P.C. to my long letter. I sincerely hope dear old boy that I have not forfeited your friendship by making that appeal to you on behalf of my son (vi), whose lamentable financial position is the direct result of his patriotism in giving 41/2 years of his life to his country as a soldier, as one of the 8 million British heroes who were mainly instrumental in smashing the despicable Huns, as explained in my last letter. Surely he deserves some consideration.
If however his case does not appeal to your generosity pray forget it & my appeal & do not permit it to cause a breach between you & me at this later period of our lives.
Your’s very sincerely . John H. Hackworth