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Aet. 46, to Henry William Massingham, editor of the Daily Chronicle. A controversy was raging, mainly in the Daily Chronicle and Harmsworth’s Daily Mail, over W.H. Smith & Sons’ refusal to sell Harmsworth Magazine, a 3-penny weekly priced at half the conventional newsstand price.

W.H. Smith contended that mogul Alfred Harmsworth was seeking to destroy the profitability of their newsstand trade and gain control of the market, while Harmsworth argued his only enemies were profit-mongers such as Smith, who controlled the market after his own fashion.

This letter was headlined “Messrs. Smith as Censors.” The interview George Moore mentioned in his letter was “The Censor of the Strand” in the Daily Chronicle (13 June 1898), concerning the refusal of W.H. Smith to stock Evelyn Innes. He continued the discussion in the Westminster Gazette (24 June and 7 July 1898).

William Faux (1833-1909) was the general manager at W.H. Smith & Son who faced George Moore over numerous boycotts of his books. Faux had said of Esther Waters: “We do not care to circulate this kind of pre-Raphaelite nastiness on our stalls… We make it a rule not to offer for sale works of a morbid or prurient tendency. Mr. Moore’s book, in our opinion, comes within that class, and we have therefore removed it from circulation.” This quote of Faux is from an interview headlined “Mr. George Moore’s Banned Book” in the Pall Mall Gazette, evening edition, (9 June 1894).

George’s quotation of Smith on boycotting comes from The Life of the Right Hon. W. H. Smith, M.P. by Sir Herbert Maxwell, vol. I (London: John Murray, 1893, pages 43-45). In 1898, the firm was headed by Smith’s son, William Frederick Danvers Smith (1868–1928), later 2nd Viscount Hambleden.

The letter from W.H. Smith & Son referenced in George’s letter was headlined “The Great Magazine War. Messrs. Smith’s Defence of Their Position” in the Daily Chronicle (16 July 1898). It was preceded and followed by letters from Harmsworth denying everything claimed by W.H. Smith.

Isaac Gordon was a witness before the Commons Select Committee on Money Lending on 6 July 1897. He was an unscrupulous money lender with offices in London, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Oxford and Bristol.