Letter 2699

Flamsteed claims that he has always kept up a correspondence with Sloane’s predecessors, including Dr Crown, Mr Oldenburg, and Mr Collins. He writes: ‘& I desired to have done the same with their successors. How I have been prevented you know best. I am sure I never gave any occasion.’ Flamsteed has been told that at a Council meeting of the Royal Society it was said that he spoke ill of them. He asks Sloane to testify for him if anything should happen again. The reason he does not attend meetings is because the time and day is very inconvenient for him. Flamsteed was an astronomer, had a crucial role in the founding the of the Royal Observatory, and participated in academic debates relating to astronomy (Frances Willmoth, Flamsteed, John (16461719), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2008 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/9669, accessed 21 June 2013]).