ABSTRACT
In answer to your kind letter dated the 12th of January, I must acquaint you first of all that my gold medal of Captain Cook is to be given to the Duke of Marlborough as he desired me to subscribe for him. I subscribed likewise for a silver one, which I beg you will be so good as to give it to Mrs Ramsden, who will pay the money for me. …1
There seems to have been no subsequent contact between Ramsden and his wife, and the bad feeling between Ramsden and Peter Dollond in 1789, delicately remarked on by de Rochon in 17902 (see Chapter 10) is testimony of their relationship. Sarah assisted her brothers with both their practical work and their accounts. In later years she was writing to Matthew Boulton, acting as agent to transmit a request from Poli who was asking that Boulton and Watt supply a steam engine to be erected there.3 Oddly, steam engines were not prohibited machinery under the various Acts banning export of technology.
