Day book of Thomas Jones, Pencerrig

Reference: NLW MS 23811E

From 1788 to 1797 Thomas Jones used this volume to keep detailed accounts. His activity as squire of Pencerrig and magistrate, as artist and as family man, is reflected in the details of moneys received and payments made. Receipts, listed on the left-hand pages, include payments of rents, tithes and farm produce. Expenditure, on the right-hand pages, is still more varied, including payments for goods, for work by servants, farm workers and craftsmen as well as land tax payments and poor rates. Domestic expenditure, including food, drink, clothing, newspapers and magazines, are all recorded in detail. Entries reflecting his artistic activity are comparatively scarce, though he does mention buying '6 yards of Primed cloth' in 1790 (f. 27). The last such reference is dated 1 October 1793, when he bought a box of watercolours (f. 61).

Jones seems to have inherited the volume, perhaps from a relative, for the first seventeen folios contain a barrister's accounts for 1758-61, detailing charges made for services rendered to individuals in London and Wales. These records are in an unidentified hand.