Reference
Z699/271
Title
Attached to Z699/272
Charles May to Sharples & Co. 7 April 1856 3 Great George St Westminster 4th mo 7.1856
Copy
Dear Friends
I understand from my brother E.H.Strange that you are desirous of conducting the banking business more separate from the shop than has hitherto been the case and for this purpose that you have endeavoured to find an office in some other situation.
It has long been my wish that E.H.S. should have more accommodation for some branches of his business in the shape of warehouses & work rooms & that this should be more compact than the present premises admit of & an opportunity having occurred of purchasing the Cross Keys Inn I have embraced it & believe it will accomplish the purpose very fully.
I hope you will not consider me too officious in entering a little on the subject of the bank agency: as a direct agency considering the time that it has taken & the losses that have been thrown upon the late firm. I believe on the whole it has never paid its expenses & in arguing this with your late partner J.Lucas he took the ground that I overrated the value of services rendered & the profit to be derived whilst I did not sufficiently consider the collateral advantages to the trade of the shop in having the banking transactions attached to it.
I fancy & here have the vanity still of believing that I can form a pretty correct estimate of both sides of the account: the position of your banking business in Ampthill has been made by the steady attention of my late Father & his successor E.H.S. & whilst I have no intention to question your right to open a detached office I feel equally that you will not question E.H.S,'s right to continue a banking agency attached to his own business in order to retain whatever advantage may arise from it, and which advantage alone has consisted the inadequate compensation of the last 30 years attention to your agency: perhaps the shortest way of explaining my ideas is to say that I consider the goodwill of the banking business to belong to E.H.S. exactly as it belonged to my Father when he transferred the account from the Leighton bank to Hitchin & in thus freely expressing my views I am equally ready to say that I should much regret to see a connection of so long standing severed, it must however be evident to you that E.H.S. could not pay constant attention at a detached office without losing more by his absence from the shop than would accrue by attention to the bank, i.e. if the scale of remuneration for the future is to be based upon that of the past.
I suggest however that the purchase I have alluded to may be the means of avoiding any difficulty as an office may I think at a very moderate expense be made contiguous to the shop of a character suited to the purpose & so as to combine & advance all interests concerned. For myself, I seek nothing beyond ordinary rent, the promotion of my brother's interest being my only motive to purchase the property.
You will of course infer that E.H.S. consults my brother Francis & myself on business matters but I think it right to say that this is written without his knowledge or instigation. I trust you will receive it in the spirit with which it is written & believe me
Yours sincerely
(signed) Charles May.
Sharples & Co.
Hitchin.
Date free text
7 April 1856
Production date
From: 1856 To: 1856
Exent
No. of pieces: 1
Format
paper
Level of description
item