I trust that this letter will be handed to you by Thomas Little, a convict on board the Norfolk Transport, whom I hope and believe from the circumstances of his character from childhood, to the time of his offending the justice of the country, you will befriend to the utmost of your power and influence. Under that expectation, I have obtained his destination to be Van Dieman's Land, and I have been personally assured by Mr. Under Secretary Phillips, and the Home Office, that your position in relation to the Government at Hobart Town, and the estimation in which you are held throughout the colony, will enable you to serve him essentially. You know that I have never interfered with you before respecting any individual, except John [Oftor?], who came out under very different circumstances, and yet I assure you I have had application to move you in other cases which I have found it difficult to resist.
Little is sentenced to transportation for life, for the crime of forgery. He and his wife are the children of pious parents. They were both religiously trained, and, in an exemplary manner, have both trained their own children. Their father and mother, from youth, have been members of the church of the late eminent Mr. Thorpe of Bristol where the Littles were born and married. A paper enclosed, a copy of a Memorial sent in to the Secretary of State, with the hope of obtaining a commutation of of [sic] the sentence, will aprise you of his reputation at Bristol. Mr. Frost, mentioned at the commencement of that paper, sent in a separate memorial. He is retired from business & lives in West Square Lambeth, where I have seen him. So great was the confidence of this gentleman in Little, from knowledge of him as a boy in his service from ten years of age until he apprenticed him to himself, and [hired ?] him afterwards in the capacity of confidential clerk, traveller for his house, and first assistant in his business, until Little went into buisness in London on his own account, that Little the convict, became, and is at this moment, a trustee for Mrs Frost under a deed of Settlement. I have been in intimate connexion with Mr. Whittaker, of the firm of Whittaker & [Goerbury?], of Basinghall Street, who is his prosecutor, and an Assignee under the Bankruptcy arrangement upon the prosecution, with Mr. George Meek, the other assignee, of the firm of Meek Britten &c. in Cateaton Street, and with whom I have dined in private at his house in Russell Square, and I have seen several of his other creditors, and they all testify to the fact of their unbowed confidence in Little's integrity, and to his unblemished character, to the time of his transgression. I will state briefly an outline of the Case.
Little was carrying on business with a partner as a wholesale woollen draper in Basinghall Street, and with a retail trade at a house in Leadenhall Street, where he and his wife and family resided, and was in [one word illegible], when the failure of a firm he had credited, converted what he thought a good debt to him of £1800 into a bad one. His capital was small, his credit untarnished, and believing he could struggle through the difficulty occasioned to him by this loss, he appears to have forged some small bills, which every Creditor, prosecutor and ally tell me they have no doubt he intended to pay. For these he obtained immediate [one word illegible] to meet his engagements. Meantime his affairs became embarrassed, he assigned all his property to Trustees, & at a Meeting of his creditors they gave him his household furniture. He borrowed £15 of a neighbour in Leadenhall Street, to pay for the carriage of the goods to Bristol, and removed thither with his wife & children & there he prepared to [one word illegible], when he was taken by officers from London, hastily brought to town in custody, immediately examined on a charge of forgery, and committed to Newgate for Trial. It was on a bill for £49. There is no doubt that he was arranging by the sale of his furniture and in other ways, to meet the bills as they fell due— it is a fact that he had sent the money for this bill to London, 17 days before it became due, to a friend here, an accountant, whom he engaged to take the bill up, but who incautiously lent the money to a mutual friend of his own and Little's, and the money was not returned until an hour too late. The accountant was ignorant of the peculiar exactitude required in this affair, and was perhaps less carefull of Little's credit than he would have been had not Little failed — but, however than might be, Mr. Whittaker the holder of the bill, upon it being returned to him, with the keenness of a business eye suspected the genuineness of the bill, ascertained its real character by an immediate inquiry, and suspecting more than met the eye, and suffering under the apprehension of extensive fraud, instantly sent the police to Bristol, and, before he cooled, thrust Little into a felon's cell. I have reason to think that Mr. Whittaker might have retraced his steps, if possible, had he and Mr. Meek been propitiated afterwards—but an interview which they had with Little, in Newgate, was provocative of feeling on both sides, to the injury of Little, and the creditors urging the prosecution rigorously, Little was convicted, and his fammily ruined. Under the Bankruptcy, his furniture at Bristol was siezed and sold, his wife and children were rendered homeless and destitute and the man comes out to you for the remaining years of his existence.
I knew nothing of the family or the facts I have stated until about six weeks ago upon coming out of Norfolk, where I had been for six weeks previously, I first learned the existence of such a man and the calamity resulting to his wife and children. It appears that from the time of their coming to London in 1826 they had constantly attended the ministry of the Rev. D. Andrews at Walworth, where the wife became, & remains, in the opinion of Dr. A. and all who know here, a worthy member of his Church. The Doctor is an episcopal Clergyman of high character, as an evangelical Minister, preaching in his own freehold chapel, a large and beautiful edifice at Walworth, to a large church and congregation peculiarly his own, and his ministry has been eminently useful in that increasing suburb. Upon the removal of Little's family into Leadenhall Street about two years ago, they attended at the Weigh-house and there Mrs. Little became a communicant, but continued in connexion at Dr. A.'s. In both congregations they were respected for their demeanour and unblemished reputation. It is remarkable that the husband in all the relationships of life, as a tradesman, a neighbour, a friend, a husband, and a father, has been until this dreadful catastrophe, in every way exemplary, strictly exemplary. He was a very early riser, teaching his children until he breakfasted & left them for the daily duties of his counting house, and resuming their tuition upon his coming home after tea until their bed-time. He was as regular, too, in the conducting of worship in his family morning & evening — this was never remitted, and it is remarkable that he continued this duty until he was apprehended for the crime which consigns him ignominiously to your shores.
Much more might be said respecting Little, but my paper tells me I have said enough, with the only view I have, namely, to beg for the sake of his afflicted wife and five infant children, the oldest under nine years of age, and another within three months of being born, that you will immediately use the means, which may be in your power, to mitigate to the utmost extent the misery of his situation. His station in life has been respectable, and, comparing it with the condition in which he will reach you, his fall is low indeed. I have heard of cases in which a convict has been articled as a servant for life to his own wife. Could you see the poor wife of the unhappy Little, as I have, an intelligent pious woman of good capacity, a gentlewoman in demanour, and look at their five, thoroughly well-instructed children, you would not, as I believe you will not, hesitate to rescue the father from the ignominy which, I fear, may otherwise await him, and enable him to exert himself to regain in your colony the position in society which he has forfeited in England, so that, if his wife, after her confinement, should come out to you with the hope of having her husband ultimately restored to her, she may not meet with a disappointment, from the situation in which she finds him, to break her heart, and have six infants motherless, without a father to protect them.
I am aware of the full extent of the kindness I would extract from you in behalf of this family. But, remember, it is the first time since you left England that I have sought to interest you for any person in such a situation as Little, or for anyone who has transgressed the laws of his country, and that the circumstances I have stated may well excuse my advocacy. The interest I have taken in their calamity to befriend them, has extended much beyond writing this to you. It has pleased God to enable me to raise money, by great personal activity, and to overcome many difficulties in getting it together for the widowed wife, beside using other exertions, which I have not ceased from, until the moment of my concluding this letter. In another I hope to be enabled to write you respecting myself and family.