MS Buxton 5. Printed pamphlet by Sir Harris Nicolas | |
| Inventory Number: | 16085 |
| Object Type: | Archive |
| EAD Extent: | Printed pamphlet, 43 pages plus final blank verso, no covers, sewn (paginated 4-43) |
| EAD Scope and Content: | Printed pamphlet, Sir H[arris] Nicolas, 'Statement of the Circumstances Respecting Mr. Babbage’s Calculating Engines', 1843. Printed with no author’s name but annotated [by Babbage] ‘by the late Sir H. Nicolas’. Another manuscript annotation occurs on p. 6, identifying the Chancellor of the Exchequer there referred to as Lord Goderich. Dated 1843 on front or title-page and August 1843 at end. It covers the complete history of the Difference Engine from 1822 to its final abandonment in 1843. Item 55 in Babbage’s own bibliography. The text is reprinted in full as chapter VI of 'Passages', pp. 68-96, with the following introductory paragraph: ‘The following statement was drawn up by the late Sir Harris Nicolas, G.S.M. & G., from papers and documents in my possession relating to the Difference Engine. I believe every paper I possessed at all bearing on the subject was in his hands for several months.’ Nicolas was both lawyer and antiquary, Babbage’s point in his last sentence and in entrusting the obituary of the Difference Engine to him, being that it represented a disinterested and unimpeachable statement of the facts such as a historian or judge would derive from the evidence of documents. |
| Collection Group: | Buxton Collection |
There are no associated narratives. | |
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