Ireland Shakespeare Forgeries - Further Forgeries

Further Forgeries

With his next discovery William Henry moved from mere forgery to original art. Having learned—apparently from a chance remark by one of his father’s friends rather than by research—that Henry Wriothesley, 3rd Earl of Southampton had been Shakespeare’s patron, he decided to create correspondence between them. “Doe notte esteeme me a sluggarde nor tardye for thus havyinge delayed to answerre or rather toe thank you for youre greate Bountye,” he has Shakespeare write sans punctuation. “ratitude is alle I have toe utter and that is tooe greate ande tooe sublyme a feeling for poore mortalls toe expresse O my Lord itte is a Budde which Bllossommes Bllooms butte never dyes.” The Earl of Southampton replies in a similar vein, also sans punctuation, and with a similar spelling: “…as I have beene thye Freynde soe will I continue aughte thatte I canne doe forre thee praye commande me ande you shalle fynde mee Yours Southampton”. To explain how both letters could end up together in the same collection William Henry added a note explaining that Shakespeare’s was a “Copye” of the letter he sent. Samuel Ireland and his friends admired the style of the letters but not the earl’s penmanship; William Henry, not knowing that handwriting of the earl was extant, had written Southampton’s reply with his left hand.

A flood of documents now followed, all coming from Mr. H’s miraculous chest. Shakespeare’s “Profession of Faith” proved he was a Protestant, a letter to fellow-actor Richard Cowley showed he was a “a perfect good natured man”, and a letter from Queen Elizabeth made it clear that he was favoured by the most powerful person in the land. A sketch of himself that accompanied his letter to Cowley showed that he was a wretched draftsman with an impenetrable sense of humour. Described in the letter as a “whysycalle conceyte”, it was (as Malone put it) “most truly whimsical, being a miserable drawing of our poet done by himself with a pen, from Martin Droeshout’s print of him engraved seven years after his death….” There were also theatrical receipts, contracts, a letter and poem to his future wife, "Anna Hatherrewaye", and even books from Shakespeare’s library, complete with marginal annotations actually signed by the bard himself. Of most interest however were a manuscript of King Lear Shakespeare had prepared for the press, a few stray leaves of "Hamblette", and two previously unknown plays, Vortigern and Rowena and Henry II.