£140
** VERDUN/CLERMONT-IN-ARGONNE - P.O.W.'s WIFE's LETTER HOME WITH OVAL "SHIP LETTER/GRAVESEND"; 18 Jan. 1813 EL (single sheet with mention of an enclosed lock of hair - no longer present) written by Anne Fanshawe at Clermont[-in-Argonne], close to Verdun where her husband Commander Henry Fanshawe (of HMS Grasshopper that had been stranded during a storm with blizzards on the Texel sands on the Dutch coast in December 1811) was being held as a Prisoner of War, to her father Major General Jenkinson at the Board of Green Cloth in London. It has a partly fine small double-oval "SHIP LETTER/[Crown]/GRAVESEND" (the rare Rob.S3; only known for 1814) on the front with "1/8" charge and a London 5 March backstamp. The letter includes; "...I find I can now write by Jersey... F [her POW husband] has had all his [hair] shaved off & wears a wig - I send you a wave of it... he parted with his locks whilst we were at Verdun where we stayed a week". Senior British POW Officers were allowed to have their wives sent to join them if they were on parole and could afford it. Letters from their wives are rare. Cross Reference: JERSEY POSTAL HISTORY, MILITARY - P.O.W. MAIL, KENT, SHIP LETTERS
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