Stampless Letter to Mr. Meredith (1797)

Stampless Letter to Mr. Meredith (1797)

This article is about a small slip of paper that I refer to as a stampless letter to Mr. Meredith. I am not sure if, strictly speaking, it is in the province of philately. I do not believe that this document was carried through the mail. Instead, this note (or really an invoice) would have been sent via a messenger. However, the great thing about being a collector is you can add whatever you want to your own collection! This invoice is from a musician to a patron. It is dated 1797 and is a perfect piece for my collection. If you have an interest in stampless covers make sure to check out this article about a Breitkopf & Härtel cover from 1845.

The small piece of paper carries two messages, the first is from a musician asking for payment for a service. This is an age old problem many musicians face. No matter the prominence or wealth of someone who hires a musician, they can be slow to pay. Here is a tip as true today as during historical periods. Most musicians live hand to mouth and expect to be paid at the time of their gig.

On the back of this invoice, a third person verifies that he has received the money on behalf of the musician. It is a receipt that I presume the person paying kept as proof the bill was paid. Of course, I saw this document about a musician and the early date of 1797 and wanted to know more. According to the seller of this item, the document comes from papers from the prominent Meredith family of Philadelphia. While I cannot definitively answer all the questions that this piece raises, I have some circumstantial thoughts about the people involved in Philadelphia.

The Stampless Letter to Mr. Meredith

Stampless letter to Mr. Meredith
Stampless letter to Mr. Meredith

First, a transcription of the original document:

To Mr. Meredith, April 21st, 1797

Sir | Please to pay the Bearer of this Four Dollars Due to Me for Playing at a Small Party at Your House –Four weeks Illness have Made Me Bare in Cash or Should not have Sent for it – Your Compliance will Greatly Oblige / Your obt. Servt. / C. Anthony Heim

The Receipt

Now, let’s look at the reverse side – or the receipt.

April 22nd, 1797

Received of Mr. Meredith in full four dollars for Musick for C. Anthony Heim.

By me. Henry Bohlen.

Mr. Meredith

Assuming the seller is correct and this came from the papers of the prominent Meredith family in Pennsylvania, then that helps to start the search. The prominent “Mr. Meredith” at the time was William Tuckey Meredith (1772-1844). Meredith was a successful attorney and in 1814 became president of the Schuykill Bank. In 1795, he was married Gertrude Gouverneur Ogden, who was the niece of the “founding father” Gouverneur Morris.

Furthermore, William Tuckey Meredith was a leader in the community serving on the Philadelphia Common and Select Councils. The most famous member of the Meredith family was his eldest son, William Morris Meredith, who was born in 1799. He was also a banker and would serve as the United States Secretary of the Treasury in Zachary Taylor’s administration.

However, this document predates the birth of that famous Meredith. At the time, his father, William Tuckey Meredith was 25 years old. It makes sense that he and his bride of two years would have had a small party during the winter of 1797 and hired a musician to entertain.

The Musician

The musician who is requesting payment on this document signs his name as C. Anthony Heim. I believe that this is Charles Anthony Heim, a German immigrant who was known to be a prominent keyboardist in Philadelphia in the late 18th century.

What we can learn about him is through the history of the Church of the Holy Trinity in Philadelphia. This Catholic church served German immigrants of the City and they also opened a school. In 1789, they hired a Mr. Anthony Heim, presumably Charles Anthony Heim, to be in charge of the school. Another condition of his hiring was that Mr. Heim was also hired as the organist for the Holy Trinity Church.

What more can we learn about our musician? Well, we also find that Charles Anthony and Catharine Heim were sponsors of Catharine Fitzgerland whose baptism was at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Lancaster, Pennsylvania on June 14, 1796.

It is interesting to learn from these two documents that Charles Anthony Heim was Catholic. While Pennsylvania was fairly tolerant to various religious groups, there were not that many Catholics there. According to Sister Blanche Marie in “The Catholic Church in Colonial Pennsylvania” there were only about 1,300 Catholics in all of Pennsylvania in 1757.

The final document I have found about Heim is about his will. Heim’s will was written on July 26th, 1797, and it was “proved” (meaning he had died) on August 17th. This was a mere four months after the date on the document, or invoice, in my possession. Speculatively, It seems the illness he mentions in the note would prove to be fatal.

House music in 1797

One further thought. We do not know exactly what music was performed at Mr. Meredith’s party in early 1797. Mr. Heim may have played multiple instruments and he may have played in a small ensemble for this small party. However, given it was an intimate affair, it is likely he was a solo act. If so, I would suggest that he may have been playing a pianoforte. It is rather unlikely he would play organ for such a gathering. While Heim may have played guitar or violin, we don’t know what instrument he played, but we do know he played keyboard instruments.

My best guess is that Heim would have played a square piano, a fashionable instrument in the homes of well to do at the time. Is it even possible that a young wealthy couple like the Meredith’s would have had the latest instrument of a local maker? Might they have a piano by the early Philadelphia piano builder Charles Albrecht who was active at that time in the city? Who knows? But it is interesting speculation. Maybe, that evening in 1797 would have featured an instrument similar to the one below.