In a valuable article on “The Dating of Shenstone's Letters,” published some years ago, Professor John Edwin Wells succeeded in verifying or correcting the dates of eighty-nine of the one hundred eleven letters collected in volume iii of the poet's Works. Unfortunately, as Professor Wells noted in the introduction of his article, the dates assigned to these letters by the editor are not trustworthy:
The most casual reading of the studies of any of the persons connected with the Shenstone circle ever so slightly, causes one to realize that the earlier letters at least have been and are used considerably as bases for dating facts and events of minor literary and personal history of the time. The dating given by Dodsley in his edition of the Letters is the dating generally accepted without further consideration. Study of the letters, however, indicates that the year given in the dating of many of the letters, is evidently not Shenstone's but has been inserted by the editor ... The dating of many of the letters is incorrect.