Correspondence James Watt Jr. to John Southern from 1812 to 1816

Letters from James Watt Jr. to John Southern, head of the Drawing Office, from 1812 to 1816. Several of the letters are also addressed to William Creighton, who frequently assisted Southern in the Drawing Office, and who became Head of the Drawing Office on Southern’s death in 1815. Many of the letters are also addressed simply to “Boulton Watt & Co.”, but are docketed by Southern. The bundle also includes a letter to James Miller Jr., dated 6 September 1814. Miller, James Watt’s grandson, worked in the Drawing Office under Southern from 1813 to early 1815.

This arrangement of Watt Jr.’s letters and memoranda to the Drawing Office at Soho, was created in the 1890s by Henry Hazleton. Southern and Creighton may have originally kept the letters in smaller separate yearly bundles.

The letters are dated as follows:

Nos. 2-18. 1812
Nos. 19-26. 1813
Nos. 27-33. 1814
Nos. 34-39. 1815
Nos. 40-49. 1816