A Journal of Occurrences at the Temple, during the Confinement of Louis XVI, King of France. By M. Cléry, the King's Valet-de-Chambre. Translated from the original Manuscript by R. C. Dallas, Esq. …

London: Printed by Baylis, Greville-Street, and Sold by the Author, No. 29, Great Pulteney-Street, Golden-Square, and by all the Booksellers in Town and Country. 1798. FIRST EDITION. 8vo (in 4s), 200 x 122 mms., pp. [iv], 235 [236 directions for plates], with adverts on verso of half-title, engraved plate before first page of text, another engraved plate between pages 98 and 99, and ms. facsimile at end of text, contemporary tree calf, gilt spine, red leather label (both rather faded), possibly rebacked with old spine laid down; some foxing to the first few and last few leaves, but nonetheless a very good copy indeed. Jean-Baptiste Cléry (1759-1809) had close access to Louis XVI, King of France, as his valet, holding that position most crucially during the period of the king's imprisonment in the Temple: the king "was arrested on 25 September 1793," and later "avoided the fate of the guillotine," only to be "freed on 27 July 1794" (Wikipedia). Cléry's journal of this time, popular when printed, gained him a knighthood. Cléry was also an heir of the king, as in his will Louis XVI bequeathed him "my clothes, my books, my watch, my purse, and all other small effects which have been deposited with the council of the commune" (ibid.). The provenance of this copy of Cléry's Journal of Occurrences at the Temple (1798) is remarkable. The neat contemporary inscription on the title-page reads, "Bridget Atkinson / Temple Sowerby". This is Bridget Atkinson (1732-1814) of Temple Sowerby, Cumbria, in the north of England. A pioneering conchologist, Atkinson was the first woman to be elected an honorary member of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Moreover, she was the first person of any kind to be elected an honorary member of the society, and was so elected in 1813 at the inaugural meeting of the society, according to the excellent and beautifully-illustrated webpage "Bridget Atkinson, Georgian Shell Collector" on the English Heritage website. Rightly known for her collecting of shells, Bridget Atkinson is also known for her wide learning, and incessant curiosity. The English Heritage site illustrates one book known from her library, The British Housewife, which shows her neat signature atop the title-page, as with the Cléry item on offer, but the Cléry volume dovetails with her more intellectual, more political, and more international interests than her copy of The British Housewife. Her internationalism is thematized on the English Heritage site in the section headed "An Intercontinental Network", where her wide contacts for conchological research are outlined: Atkinson "never left Britain, and rarely left the county of Cumbria, but her family and friends travelled across continents and sent her shells by ship, carriage and cart …" (ibid.). Atkinson's "receipt book", with hundreds of recipes for culinary and medicinal purposes, also survives, written in 1806 "for her eldest child, Dorothy Clayton, who lived at Chesters in Northumberland" (ibid.). Bridget Atkinson has been in the news during March 2024, because several hundred specimens from her shell collection, including some from an expedition of Captain Cook, were recently rediscovered, and are to be exhibited shortly. As the newspaper The Guardian noted, "Tom White, the principal curator of non-insect invertebrates at the Natural History Museum, has been helping the project. He said the collection contained numerous rare species and described Atkinson as 'one of the earliest known women to have amassed a scientifically significant shell collection from around the world' " (Mark Brown, "Shells from Captain Cook's Final Voyage Saved from Skip," The Guardian, March 12, 2024). Tracing names and dates given on the English Heritage site, it would seem likely that Bridget Atkinson's copy of Cléry's Journal was passed down from Atkinson to her youngest daughter Jane (1775-1855); and that Jane passed it on to her own niece Sarah Clayton (1795-1880); and that Clayton passed it down to her brother, the famous Hadrian's Wall archaeologist John Clayton (1792-1890), and that he passed it down to his nephew, Nathaniel George Clayton, whose bookplate graces this copy of Cléry's Journal. This book therefore likely passed through the hands of five family members across four generations, all the while remaining firmly within the family. It was Nathaniel George Clayton who founded the site museum called Chesters Roman Fort And Museum, where Dr Frances McIntosh, curator, is currently investigating Bridget Atkinson's rediscovered shells (Dr McIntosh is also the Curator of Hadrian's Wall). This printed book by Monsieur Cléry from 1798, about the king of France and the height of the French Revolution, is the only printed book known to me that is inscribed by Bridget Atkinson which remains in private hands. In some of issues of this work "booksellers" in the imprint is spelled "bookselllers"; and other issues have a list of subscribers, not present in thlis copy.