The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1836-10-11 00:00:00

DUKE OF BRUNSWICK AND MRS. GRAHAM.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE MORNING CHRONICLE.
Sta,—Having just now perused the statement of Captain
Currie in the columns of your journal, I am compelled, although
only partially restored to sight at preseut, to take up my pen,
requesting you will have the goodness to insert what I now state
in your respectable journal. It is true I last week wrote an
account.of the dreadful accident under which I am labouring,
and when the newspapers containing the seine, with my signa-
ture attached, were brought and read to me, I regretted to seve-
ral individuals that my own expressions were so mutilated, at
the same time conceiving that on account of my sight, perhaps,
what I really wrote may have been almost unintelligible. Now,
sir, instead of writing that I saw the Duke of Brunswick step
out of the car safely on terra firma without the slightest inconveni-
ence, 1 wrote—' Immediately after the concussion to the earth,
I was suddenly elevated' in, the air, and saw his highness stand-
ing on the field." With regard to the height which I fell, I was
told that several men, who were'close to the spot, first thought
that an individual in the car had dropped a handkerchief, then
thought it a little girl, and, as I fell lower, discovered it was a
woman. I also on the day on which I was brought home from
Converse Farm (last Tuesday week) was helped to the window
of the farm to look at the large balloon belonging to Messrs.
Gye and Hughes, which passed over Doddinghurst, and dis-
tinctly heard Mr. Muir and his men exclaim—" It is the very
height Mts. Graham was when she fell from her car." With
regard to his Highness the Duke of Brunswick, I have, since
my return to town, gratefully mentioned the solicitude of his
Highness while standing over me at Converse Farm on the
evening of the accident for nearly four hours, as, since my re-
turn to reason, has been related to me by a lady, who was alto
present at the time. Another mistake in the account I gave
which surprised the is, that I have a slight recollection of my
fall to the earth, whereas, sir, I distinctly stated, that after feel-
ing myself falling on one side, after I fell from the car, I re-
member nothing until after my restoration. With regard to
the inflation of my clothes with atmospheric air, as I am con-
tradicted, all I can do is to refer to those individuals who actu-
ally saw the fact to which I allude, which circumstance, together
with the subsequent loss of my infant in embryo, my medical
attendants affirm, was the only means of saving thy life. With
respect to holding the loop, 1 have only to refer to a great num-
ber of gentlemen, even Captain Currie himself, ( who first
ascended with Mr. Graham eleven years ago,) whether it is not
almost always observed in descending when you have not a
safety bag (which
was first thought of by my husband). How-
ever, as human nature is by no means infallible, I had better
refer to other aeronauts, who have met with' equally disastrous
accidents as myself; but on this occasion his serene Highness,
I am happy to find, was exempt from the sufferings to which a
gentleman was subjected who accompanied a present celebrated
aeronaut in an aerial excursion, and which gentleman is now
living. They were both confined for a long time, but I pray
sincerely I may be the last of the profession who may be so un-
fortunate. I have to add, that I beg to inform Captain Currie
he is quite mistaken in imagining that every person I have had
the honour of conducting through the "realms of air" has ac-
companied me for the sum of ten pounds; and although I am
compelled to notice his address on the subject, still I have the.
utmost respect for him as a gentleman. Entreating, if you can
make out this apparently unintelligible scrawl of a person
partly deprived of sight, you will insert it in your valuable co-
lumns.—l am, sir, your obedient servant,
October 6. M. GRAHAM.
P.S.—One mistake which appeared in the papers in her name
Mrs. Graham will also thank to be corrected. The altitude
attained by the duke and Mrs. Graham did not quite reach
three miles, whereas she is made in the papers to have men-
tioned four miles.