Three thousand pounds

I recently came across Pat Kirkham's book on Furniture Making in London in the Eighteenth Century[i].  There are a number of interesting facts about the firm Ince & Mayhew, many of which were included in her article for the Furniture History Society[ii].

However, one detail that had escaped me up to now was that when John Mayhew married Isabella Stephenson, she had a large dowry.  Pat Kirkham writes: John Mayhew’s wife brought a large sum of money to her husband when they married in 1762, and, widowed within the year, Mayhew used approximately three thousand pounds of that money to finance his business.

I am going to re-visit the National Archives to see if there is any further information on this, but it did help to explain why Isabella's sister, Ann, William's wife, had no hesitation about taking John Mayhew to court to get a fair settlement on the break-up of the partnership.  She would no doubt have known all about that money, and would have regarded it as belonging equally to her family.  No wonder she insisted on a more balanced final payment.

[i] Kirkham, P. (1988). The London Furniture Trade 1700-1870. Furniture History, 24, I-219. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/23406689
[ii] Kirkham, P.. (1974). The Partnership of William Ince and John Mayhew 1759—1804. Furniture History, 10, 56–60.  Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/23403407