Introduction
Astell records a financial record (see figure 1) for Sutton's Hospital, also
known as King James's Hospital, but better known then (and generally
known
now) as the Charterhouse, a charitable institution created and
supported by a
bequest in the will of Thomas Sutton (1532-1611). The
"Brothers" to whom the
record refers speak to the Hospital's mission
as a pensioners' home for elderly
men, many of them sailors who, to
borrow a phrase from Gerald Davies, "had
served England well in the
hours of her need and were now left high and dry to
beg their bread
in their old age" (223). The references to "Scholars" underscore
its
other function as a school for promising boys of upstanding, but financially
limited, families. Not only Richard Steele, but Joseph Addison, John
Wesley, and,
in the nineteenth century, William Thackeray would
benefit from Sutton's gift.
The similarity between Sutton's dual-purpose foundation and Astell's Chel-
sea school for girls, itself an outgrowth of the Royal Hospital for
elderly veterans,
would not have been lost on her. Along with 80
brothers, Sutton's will made pro-
visions for 40 scholars; Astell's
Chelsea school, according to Perry, "was meant
to handle thirty poor
girls" (238).
Astell's source for this account is almost certainly Samuel Herne's Domus Car-
thusiana (1677), which, on 145-153,
transcribes in pounds, shillings, and pence the
Establishment for the Dyets, Liveries, Stipends, Wages,
and other Charges and Expences […]
at the humble Petition,
and only costs and charges of Thomas Sutton, Esquire […].
Astell's handwriting here is particularly
inscrutable; I devoted an embarrass-
ing number of months to
discovering "Fuller's Hospital," another contemporary
almshouse near
London (as it turns out), only to ascertain its utter incompatibility
with the numbers Astell recorded. I deciphered many of her other references
only
by consulting Herne.
Astell records many of the specific entries she found in Herne, though she
does at times combine several entries into a single category or ignore
single
entries entirely; she also renders Herne's roman numerals as
arabic. Interlaced
through several of the entries in smaller print are
Astell's attempts to arrive at
a "per person" figure, something Herne
does only on occasion—a point of dif-
ference tracked, along
with particularly archaic references, in the endnotes (ren-
dered as
arabic to avoid, as much as possible, confusion). The money system in
Astell's day and for nearly three centuries beyond, it should be noted,
consisted
of 12 pennies to the shilling, 20 shillings to the
pound.
