1-272-827 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Letter from Daniel Defoe to Charles Montague, 1705. Letter from writer Daniel Defoe to Charles Montague, Lord Halifax, expressing gratitude for his favours and anxiety to know the name of the 'unknown benefactor' (? Lord Treasurer Godolphin or Secretary Harley) who has sent him money, and protesting that he would always preserve the title of an honest man. The letter must have been written after Defoe's release, in August 1704, from Newgate Prison, where he had been confined for publishing The Shortest Way with the Dissenters, (1702), and he had evidently already begun to use his pen in the service of the Ministry. From the fourth series of Facsimiles of royal, historical, literary and other autographs in the Department of Manuscripts, British Museum: Series I - V, (London, 1899).