Item 10a.34 - Trinity Whist Club minute book

1 vol., quarter leather binding and marbled paper over boards; marbled endpapers and edges. Verso of front free flyleaf and 53 ff. used, rest blank. With letter (1 folded sheet) attached to notes (1 folded sheet with 6 single sheets loose inside), plus envelope.

Note by Walter Morley Fletcher, 12 Aug. 1930, on verso of front flyleaf, records his purchase of the book from 'an Ipswich bookseller' in 1905. The dealer had bought the book as part of Lord John Hervey's library on his death [in 1902]; Fletcher posits that Lord John, 'who makes the last entries.in this book', must have taken it away with him when he left college.

Gift from Sir Walter Morley Fletcher, 1930.

First 3 ff. headed 'Rules for the formation of a Club', including list of founding members: The Duke of St. Albans, Montagu Corry, J. J. Cowell,, G. O. Trevelyan, F. Storr, W. Everett, H. Y. Thompson, E. Willmot.' Signed E[dmund] Willmot, President, May 1960.

The rest of the minutes record dates of meetings and the members' rooms in which each took place; participants, including honorary members and visitors; elections of new members

With letter, written at Trinity 27 Mar. 1905, from Henry Jackson to Walter Morley Fletcher relating to Erastus Corning Pruyn. This is attached to notes by Jackson, comprising a list of members (1 folded sheet), each with a brief biography and date of their admission to Trinity, and a list of visitors (6 single sheets) with the same information. A note of the end of this states: '[W. E.] Currey tells me that the refreshments provided in the early days of the Club were sandwiches and gin sling. In its later days there was an elaborate supper, with two Trinity Hall cups, one Chesterfield, the other usually Madeira. Supper was usually at ten o' clock, after supper whist was resumed'. With envelope originally containing these notes, addressed to the Librarian, Trinity College, and with a label in the hand of A. F. Scholfield, Librarian.