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Regulations for the establishment and government of the Royal Military Asylum.

Chelsea: printed by Tilling and Hughes, 1819.

Collation: 8vo: pp. 70 and 4 folding printed tables. Manuscript and lithographed list of ‘Persons authorised to nominate... boys in the Upper school’ laid in.
Condition: 180 x 108mm. Small spot on titlepage.
Binding: Finely bound in contemporary crimson morocco with gilt filet borders and roll-tooled board edges and turn-ins, gilt ruled flat spine with circular ornaments in compartments, title tooled in gilt on upper cover, gilt edges. Very slight wear to corners and spine ends.
References: OCLC 24587072.
Price: £600

Third edition (first 1805, second 1814).

¶ The Royal Military Asylum was a school for boys and girls who were orphans, whose fathers had been killed or lost their life in foreign service,  had lost their mothers and whose fathers were serving abroad, and for those whose fathers were on foreign service and whose parents had other children to maintain. Despite this apparent benevolence to the children ‘the merit of the Father, as to Regimental Character, shall be always considered as a principal  recommendation’. The ‘Regulations’ give details of the pay and duties of the large staff, from the Commandant to the Drummer Boy, with little said about the curriculum which was under the control of the chaplain. The folding tables at the end are forms of recommendation for boys and for girls, and a diet table giving the daily menues for breakfast, dinner and supper for the children and for the sergeants, nurses etc. Laid into this copy is also a ‘List of Persons authorised by the Admiralty to nominate, by rotation, Candidates for the 300 Boys in the Upper School’. This manuscript heading is followed by a lithographed list of officers, from the First Lord of the Admiralty to the Lt. Governor of the Hospital.