The Charles Dickens Letters Project

To JOHN LILWALL,1 3 FEBRUARY 1855

Extract (3rd person) in Christie’s catalogue, November 2001; MS 1 p.; addressed Mr. Lilwall; dated Tavistock House, 3 February 1855.

Regretting that he cannot have the pleasure of complying with the request of the Early Closing Association,2 as all the public engagements of that nature he had leisure to make during the present year, are already made.

• 1. John Lilwall (1817-92), founder, 1842, and Honorary Secretary of the Early Closing Association; author of The Half-Holiday Question Considered, with Some Thoughts on the Instructive and Healthful Recreations of the Industrial Classes, 1856.
• 2. The Early Closing Association, based at 35 Ludgate Hill, London, aimed to reduce “within reasonable limits” the hours of employment in industrial life, which included offices, banks and the wholesale trade, besides manufactures. In freeing evening hours for recreation and self-instruction, the Association stressed educational and moral development. See To Hugh Evans, 3 March 1851.