Elizabeth Willing, Mrs Stirling, reports a miscarriage 1829

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There are and were many John Stirlings and the key which unlocks the identity to this one is provided by the address at number 5 in the Bow Church yard which surrounds St Mary le Bow (with its Oranges & Lemons Great Bell of Bow) just off London’s Cheapside. The Post Office Directory of 1827 lists Stirling, John Mercht and Stirling, Walter Mercht at Number 5. Add to that the Clan Stirling seal on the letter and it is clear that these are two brothers who by the 1820s were the remaining partners in the Glasgow-based Stirling Brothers and Company founded in 1803. The company dealt in imported tobacco from America and cotton from both America and India as well as finished textiles; in a recent academic study, Georgina Arnott assigns to John Stirling the task of securing supplies of cotton. He was a junior member of the extensive merchant family, the Stirlings of Cadder, which made its wealth from the typical products of slavery - sugar, tobacco, cotton – products which were also and more generally the basis of Glasgow’s economy in the eighteenth and early nineteenth century.That John Stirling (1786-1860) travelled extensively is indicated by his marriage: in 1816 he married his second cousin Elizabeth Willing (1796-1874) in Philadelphia where her family was prominent both commercially and politically. Her grandfather Thomas Willing became the richest man in America, president of the Bank of North America and the First Bank of the United States. Elizabeth is the author of this letter sent from St Andrews in Scotland where since 1827 she and her husband have their home.

Between 1817 and 1839 Elizabeth is recorded as giving birth to twelve children one of whom died in his first year, another in her seventh, and three who died in their teens including a John who in 1854 was killed at the battle of Inkerman in Crimea. Elizabeth has written only the salutation and farewell to this letter as illustrated by the image below; the rest has been dictated.

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Transcription

Addressed: To John Stirling Esqr.   (5.) Bow Church yard   Cheap side   London

Datelined: Friday    St Andrews     23d January 1829

My dear Husband

As I feel uncertain as to the ship sailing I think it better to write to let you know I had a miscarriage last night after a good deal of suffering but am thankful doing as well today as can be expected. Dr Moodie was with me and confirms my own opinion that nothing more could have been done than has been done to prevent this taking place. I fully expected a letter from you today but expect to hear tomorrow to say when you sail. I have only to add all the children are well and I will write myself as soon as I am able

Yours most affectionately

Eliza ^th  Stirling

P.S. It was a Boy

Acknowledgment and References

Emma Jolly sorted out the right John Stirling and provided other helpful information about John and Elizabeth Stirling.

Arnott, Georgina: “Slavery, trade and settler colonialism: The Stirling family and Britain’s empire, c. 1730-1840”. Australian Journal of Biography and History, (6), 51–78.

Wikipedia: Thomas Willing 1731-1821.