Title	[Correspondence from Richard Brinsley Sheridan]
Date	1800-08-15
Creator	Sheridan, R. B.
Contributor	Mr. Peake
Artistic roles	Richard Brinsley Sheridan (Playwright, Manager)
Genre	Comedy
Theme	Popular Venues
Item description	Correspondence from Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816) to the Treasurer of Drury Lane Theatre, Mr. Peake, dated August 15th, 1800. The note is written in ink on stationery paper. It also contains an ink transcription by a previous owner believed to be from a sale in 1858. The note was adhered to a previous owner's scrapbook page, and is still in this form.
Object narrative	Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816), Irish playwright and theatre manager, was born to Thomas Sheridan, an actor-manager, and Frances Sheridan, a writer, in a fashionable area of Dublin. His father was the manager of the Theatre Royal in Dublin for a time, but the family eventually moved to London, where Sheridan was educated. In 1772 he eloped with seventeen year old Elizabeth Linley, the beautiful and talented singer daughter of composer Thomas Linley, to France, where they were married. After her father consented to the match, they returned to London and began to make their way into London society. In 1775 the Covent Garden Theatre produced Sheridan's play The Rivals, to great acclaim, and in 1776 Sheridan and Thomas Linley bought the Drury Lane Theatre. Sheridan produced The School for Scandal there in 1777, but seemed to be more interested in politics thereafter. He remained the owner of Drury Lane, but would be beset by financial troubles and impropriety for the rest of his life. Sheridan was not good at money-management, and the theatre went through several dry spells where productions were not bringing in enough money and alternative measures had to be taken to shore up the theatre's finances. 1800 was just such a year. In spite of a success the year before with the play Pizarro, which Sheridan adapted, and continued good receipts from revivals and Shakespeare, the theatre was still losing money due to high expenses and interest payments. In order to raise more money, Sheridan began selling renters shares on the theatre valued at 3,000. For each night there was a performance at the theatre, these shareholders would receive 1 (Kelly 240). It is believed this note, written from Sheridan to the Treasurer of Drury Lane, Richard Peake, was in regards to this arrangement with one such shareholder. The same day, Mr. Sheridan had written another note informing Mr. Peake of the Trustees decision to sell out the stock of a Mr. Grubbs to make up the deficiency of the renters accounts (Price 137), leading to the conclusion that many transactions in regards to the renters accounts occurred on that day. Mr. Richardson, also referred to in the note, was co-owner of the theatre with Sheridan at the time. It reads: Mr. Peake I authorise you to accept forty Pounds for Mr. Goldsmith for self and Mr. Richardson. RB Sheridan August 15th: 1800
Type	Text
Original format	Correspondence
Original publisher	[Place of publication not identified] : [publisher not identified]
Language	en
Contributing institution	Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives, UNCG University Libraries
Source collection	MSS255 Robert C. Hansen Performing Arts Collection
Series/grouping	6.1: Correspondence and Autographs -- Correspondence
Box	79
Finding aid link	http://library.uncg.edu/info/depts/scua/collections/manuscripts/ead/mss255.xml
Preferred citation	[Identification of item], Robert C. Hansen Performing Arts Collection, 1753-2006 (MSS255), Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives and Manuscripts, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, NC, USA.
Rights statement	http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0/
Additional rights information	NO COPYRIGHT - UNITED STATES. This item has been determined to be free of copyright restrictions in the United States. The user is responsible for determing actual copyright status for any reuse of the material.
Object ID	MSS255.B79.021
Digital publisher	The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, University Libraries, PO Box 26170, Greensboro NC 27402-6170, 336.334.5304
OCLC number	872280889

[Correspondence from Richard Brinsley Sheridan]

Page/Item Description