Anne L. Murphy – författare

The letters in The Worlds of the Jeake Family of Rye create a narrative across more than a century and through three generations of the Jeake family. With Samuel Jeake junior and his wife Elizabeth at its centre, this collection also touches on the lives of their parents and their children. It begins with a letter written in 1640 about the death of Samuel senior's mother, Anne, and ends with the death of Samuel and Elizabeth's last surviving child in Jamaica in 1773. Samuel Jeake is well known to early modern historians through his published diary. The letters extend our understanding of his life, business dealings and his key relationships - those with his wife, Elizabeth, and his father, also Samuel. Other correspondents include Samuel's business contacts and his extended family. This collection of letters reveals the import role kinship connections played in the management of business and to the family's survival during the religious and political upheavals at the end of the 17th century. They give detailed insights into the Jeakes' domestic life and a rare glimpse into the life and work of a middling-sort woman. Elizabeth Jeake made a significant contribution to the marital economy. The Worlds of the Jeake Family of Rye also tells the story of Samuel's troublesome brother-in-law, Nathaniel Hartshorne, who became involved in the political machinations surrounding the Exclusion Crisis and narrowly avoided execution after a short and disastrous career as a government informer. This collection of around 300 letters is accompanied by comprehensive introductions to each chapter which put the correspondence in context and complete the narrative.

The late seventeenth century was a crucial period in English financial history. A host of joint-stock companies emerged offering the opportunity for investment in projects ranging from the manufacture of paper to the search for sunken treasure. Driven by the demands of the Nine Years' War, the state also employed innovative tactics to attract money, its most famous scheme being the incorporation of the Bank of England. This book provides a comprehensive study of the choices and actions of the investors who enthusiastically embraced London's new financial market. It highlights the interactions between public and private finance, looks at how information circulated around the market and was used by speculators and investors, and documents the establishment of the institutions - the Bank of England, the national debt and an active secondary market in that debt - on which England's financial system was built.