Showing 15888 results

No information was available at the time of compilation.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

William Lygon was born in London in 1872. He was educated at Eton and Christ Church Oxford, which he left without completing his degree. He succeeded his father as Earl Beauchamp in 1891. During 1899-1901 he was briefly governor of New South Wales. Lord Beauchamp became a privy counsellor in 1906 and served as its president between Jun and Nov 1910. He became a Knight of the Garter in 1914 and was was Liberal leader in the House of Lords from 1924. Between 1929 and 1931 he was Chancellor of the University of London. Alongside his happy marriage and family life, Beauchamp had several homosexual relationships, which damaged his reputation, and he was obliged to live in exile abroad from 1931 after a warrant was issued for his arrest.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

John King was born in Lancashire in 1759. He was educated at Christ Church, Oxford and studied law at Lincoln's Inn and Gray's Inn, before being called to the bar in 1790. He became law clerk at the Home Office in 1791 and progressed to joint secretary to the Treasury by 1806. He also became MP for Enniskillen, co. Fermanagh, Ireland in 1806 but gave up the seat the same year, due to bad health. He then became comptroller of army accounts, a post he held until his death in 1830.

Charles Ingoldsby Paulet was educated at Eton and at Clare College, Cambridge, before pursuing a military career. He served as MP for Truro from 1792 to 1796. Previously known by the courtesy title of Earl of Wiltshire, Paulet succeeded his father as Marquess of Winchester in 1800. From 1812 until 1837, when the position was abolished, he was Groom of the Stole to the monarch. In 1839, Winchester adopted the surname of Burroughs-Paulet, as specified in the will of Sarah Salusbury (née Burroughs), whose property he inherited.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

The Sun Fire Office was founded in 1710 by a co-partnership of 24 'gentlemen of mixed social and professional background' to provide fire insurance following the devastation of the Great Fire of London in 1666. It is the oldest insurance company in existence; it merged with Alliance Asssurance in 1959 and with Royal Insurance (founded 1842) in 1996 to form Royal and Sun Alliance.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

Jean-Baptiste Colbert was born in Reims in 1665. He started working for the French war office aged 21 and rose to greater influence during the unsettled Fronde period (1648-1653). After Cardinal Mazarin's death in 1661 he became a high-ranking government minister, concerned with economic reform and naval affairs. His son, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Marquis de Seignelay (1651-1690) succeded him as Secretary of State of the Navy.

Peter Dollond was born in 1731. The eldest son of the optician and scientific instrument maker John Dollond (1707-1761). Peter went into partnership with his father, and later with his brother John (1746-1804). His telescopes and other instruments were popular, several were made for the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, and for the Paris Observatory. After his death in 1761, family members continued to operate the business for many years. Eventually, the business was acquired by James Aitchison; the firm of Dollond and Aitchison is still well known for selling spectacles.

Alexander Galloway rose to prominence in the radical London Corresponding Society, becoming president of the Society in 1797. He continued to campaign for democratic reform and improvements to working conditions for many years. Galloway was a member of the Worshipful Company of Leathersellers and rose to be a prominent engineer and one of London's largest employers. He also spent 17 years on the Council of Farringdon Without ward.

No information available at the time of compilation.

Charles Cockerell was born at Bishops Hull, Somerset in 1755. He was educated at Winchester College. Between 1776 and 1801 he worked for the East India Company in Bengal, spending several years as postmaster general in Calcutta. On his return to Britain, Cockerell became a successful businessman in London, with a house at Hyde Park Corner and a country estate at Sezincote, Gloucestershire. He maintained a lifelong interest in India. He served as an MP between 1802 and his death in 1837. He was made a baronet in 1809.

John Taylor was born in Norwich in 1779. The son of the yarn manufacturer and nonconformist minister John Taylor (1750-1826) and his wife Susanna née Cook (1755-1823). He trained as a land surveyor and civil engineer and became successful in the field of metal mining and a leading exponent of new mining technology. Taylor was also deeply interested in mining development overseas and in scientific education. He was a fellow of the Royal Society, a prominent member of the Geological Society of London and the Institution of Civil Engineers, and helped to found both the University of London and the British Association for the Advancement of Science. Several of his siblings were also prominent in engineering, printing and the arts.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

Charles Tilston Bright was born at Wansted, Essex in 1832. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' School before joining the Electric Telegraph Company and later the Magnetic Telegraph Company. His best known achievement, the laying of the first telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean (1858) earned him a knighthood at the age of 26. From 1860 onwards Bright worked as an independent consultant. He was also independent Liberal MP for Greenwich between 1865 and 1868.

John Coode was born in Bodmin, Cornwall in 1816. He was educated locally before being articled to a civil engineer. By the 1840s he had his own successful engineering practice in London and from the 1850s onwards regularly travelled abroad as the designer of or a consultant to large-scale port and harbour works in the British colonies. He was knighted in 1872 for his work on Portland Harbour, Dorset. Coode was also a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers, the Royal Colonial Institute, the Royal Commission on Metropolitan Sewage Discharge, and the International Commission of the Suez Canal.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

William Henry Grenfell was born in London in 1855. He was educated at Harrow School and Balliol College, Oxford. He represented the university at several sports, including two appearances in the university boat race, and continued to participate in rowing, fencing, mountaineering, hunting and other sports for many years, including appearances at national level. In later life he was president of several sporting organizations, including the Amateur Athletic Association. Grenfell also served at various times as MP for Salisbury, for Hereford and for Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, before being created Baron Desborough in 1905. He also held a variety of public offices. His wife, Ethel, was a renowned society hostess. Lord Desborough's three sons (including the war poet Julian Grenfell) all having predeceased him, the barony became extinct on his death.

Frederic George Kenyon was born in London, brought up in Shropshire, and educated at Winchester College and at New College, Oxford. He began work in the manuscripts department at the British Museum in 1889 and became known as an expert on both Greek papyri and biblical texts. He was appointed director of the museum in 1909, retaining the position until he retired in 1930. Kenyon was a Fellow of the British Academy and of the Society of Antiquaries, served terms as President of the Classical Association and the Hellenic Society, and received numerous academic honours. He was knighted in 1912.

John Henry Pyle Pafford was Goldsmiths' Librarian of the University of London Library from 1945 to 1967. He published works on librarianship, including Library Cooperation in Europe (1935) and American and Canadian Libraries: some notes on a visit in the summer of 1947 (1949), and acted as an editor of The Year's Work in Librarianship during 1939-1950. He was also an editor of literary texts, notably the Arden edition of Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale.

Walter Wilson Greg was born in Wimbledon, Surrey, and educated at Harrow School and at Trinity College, Cambridge. He joined the Bibliographical Society in 1898 and subsequently complied several bibliographies and critical works relating to English drama and theatre, mainly from the Elizabethan and earlier periods. He was also librarian of Trinity College between 1907 and 1913. Greg was a major shareholder of and occasional contributor to The Economist magazine, founded by his maternal grandfather. He was knighted in 1950 for services to the study of literature.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

Charles Kay Ogden was born in Fleetwood, Lancashire, and educated at Magdalene College, Cambridge. He subsequently became well-known as a journal editor, translator and prolific book collector; his collection is now divided between University College London and the University of California at Los Angeles. Ogden is most often remembered as the inventor of Basic English, a limited vocabulary set devised for use as an international auxiliary language.

Karl-Heinz Pfeffer was born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, in 1906. He studied English literature and sociology at university, becoming particularly interested in the study of Australian society. In the 1930s he took up a teaching post at the University of Leipzig and was known as a member of the 'Leipzig School' of sociologists. A committed supporter of Nazism, he spent the years of the Second World War teaching on aspects of Europe and the British Empire at Berlin University. After the war, he re-established his academic career in West Germany.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

David Mather Masson was born in Aberdeen and educated at Marischal College, Aberdeen, and the University of Edinburgh. He worked as a journalist in Scotland and London for several years, becoming acquainted with many leading literary figures. Masson became Professor of English at University College London in 1852 and Professor of Rhetoric and Literature at the University of Edinburgh in 1865, holding the latter position until his retirement in 1895. He became well-known as an editor and biographer and was named historiographer-royal for Scotland in 1893. He was also a noted supporter of tertiary education for women.

Thomas Carlyle was born in Ecclefechan, Annandale, Scotland on 4 December 1795. Brought up as a strict Calvinist, he was educated at the village school, Annan Academy and Edinburgh University (1809-1814) where he studied science and mathematics. After graduating from university he became a teacher at Kirkcaldy. In 1818 he moved to Edinburgh where he worked on translating German authors. Whilst in Edinburgh he also wrote articles for the Edinburgh Encyclopaedia and the Edinburgh Review. After spending two years in Edinburgh he moved to an isolated hill farm, Graigenputtoch, Dumfriesshire. At Graigenputtoch he worked on the Sartor Resartus, which was published in 1836. Carlyle moved to Chelsea, London in 1834, where he continued to give lectures, write articles, essays and books on many subjects including, history, philosophy and politics. He also contributed essays to the Westminster Review. Carlyle died age 85 in London on 5 February 1881.

Henry Holland was born in Knutsford, Cheshire in 1788. He studied in Glasgow, Edinburgh and London before becoming a physician. From 1816 until his death he practised in London, where his clientele included many rich and famous people, including Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Holland enjoyed travel: he journeyed widely in Europe throughout his life and visited North America eight times. He was made a baronet in 1853.

Born Pierre-Etienne Du Ponceau in France in 1760, Peter Stephen DuPonceau emigrated to America in 1777. He joined the American Philosophical Society in 1791, eventually serving as President from 1827 until his death in 1844. He was awarded the Prix Volney in 1838 for his work on the grammar of indigenous North American languages.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

Thomas Telford was born in Westerkirk, Dumfriesshire in 1757. He was apprenticed to a stonemason at the age of 14. He worked for several years in Scotland and England, mangaging building projects, before becoming Surveyor of Public Works in Shropshire in 1787. Telford subsequently became the designer of or a consultant to many large and important engineering projects. His best known works include the iron bridge at Ironbridge, Shropshire, the Ellesmere Canal, and the London-to-Holyhead trunk road, including the Menai Suspension Bridge. Telford served as first president of the Institution of Civil Engineers from 1820 until his death. The new town of Telford, Shropshire, was named in his honour in 1968.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

William Wallace was born and brought up in Dysart, Fifeshire, where he learned arithmetic from his father. Living in Edinburgh as a young man, he educated himself in mathematics and science before going to work as a teacher in Perth. Having become a well-known mathematician, Wallace left Scotland in 1803 to teach at the Royal Military College at Marlow, Buckinghamshire. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1804. Marlow returned to Scotland permanently in 1819 when he became Professor of Mathematics at the University of Edinburgh, a position he held until retiring in 1834.

George Frederick Ernest Albert was the second son of the Prince and Princess of Wales (later King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra). He entered the Royal Navy whilst still a boy and served as a naval officer for many years. Prince George married Princess Mary of Teck (formerly engaged to his elder brother Albert, who died in 1891) in 1893. He became Prince of Wales in 1901 on the death of his grandmother, Queen Victoria, and King George V on his father's death in 1910. The Royal Family's surname was changed from Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to Windsor in 1917, to assert their Britishness during the First World War. He celebrated his Silver Jubilee in May 1935, but died less than a year later. His eldest son succeeded him as King Edward VIII.

Walter Fitzwilliam Starkie was the first Professor of Spanish at Trinity College, Dublin, and an authority on Spanish literature and gypsy culture. He is best known as a translator of Spanish literature and drama, and for serving as the director of the Abbey Theare, Dublin, for 17 years. His sister, Enid Mary Starkie, taught French at Somerville College, Oxford.

Osbert Lancaster was born in London in 1908. He was educated at Charterhouse and at Lincoln College, Oxford, before entering the Slade School of Art. He spent most of his working life as a cartoonist for the Daily Express newspaper; his work was considered witty and topical. Lancaster was awarded the CBE in 1953 and knighted in 1975.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

David Astor was born in London and brought up in London and Buckinghamshire. His parents were Waldorf and Nancy Astor (afterwards Viscount and Viscountess Astor). David Astor was educated at Eton and at Balliol College Oxford. He joined The Observer, a newspaper then owned by his family, informally in 1941 and formally in 1946. He became editor in 1948, retaining the position until 1975; under his influence, the paper became much less conservative and more liberal in outlook. Astor was interested in social and political issues and in philanthropy throughout his life and in retirement became heavily involved in charity work. He was made a Companion of Honour in 1994.

Elias Avery Loew was born in Moscow, Russia, and emigrated to New York City as a child; he became an American citizen in 1900 and changed the spelling of his surname to Lowe in 1918. Lowe was educated at the College of the City of New York, Cornell University, the University of Halle and the University of Munich, earning his PhD in 1907. He lectured in palaeography at the University of Oxford from 1913 until 1936, when he was given a professorship at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. The author of the seminal Codices Latini antiquiores (11 vols, 1934-1971) Lowe was recognized as one of the world's leading researchers in palaeography. He received many academic honours, including the Bibliographical Society's gold medal (1959).

Henry Spencer Moore was born in Castleford, Yorkshire, and educated locally before training as a teacher. After the First World War he studied at the Leeds School of Art and subsequently at the Royal College of Art in London, which enabled him to fulfill his childhood ambition of becoming a sculptor. His work, in a modernist style and much of it on a large scale, was a financial and often also a critical success over several decades. Towards the end of his life he endowed the Henry Moore Foundation, which continues to promote contemporary art.

Laurence Edward Alan [Laurie] Lee was born and educated in Gloucestershire. He lived in London and Spain as a young man, working in a variety of jobs, and fought on the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War. During the Second World War he worked as a film scriptwriter for the Ministry of Information. Lee's first volume of poetry was published in 1944 and he subsequently wrote a variety of fiction and non-fiction works. He is best known, however, for Cider with Rosie (1959), the first of his three volumes of autobiography. He received the MBE in 1952 and was made a freeman of the City of London in 1982.

No information was available at the time of compilation.

Little is known about Charles King's life. He was a regular contributor to The British Merchant, a periodical that began to be produced after the end of the War of the Spanish Succession in 1713 and argued against a proposed commercial treaty with France. King produced a collection of some of the more important articles, which was published in three volumes in 1721, also under the title The British Merchant; the work was influential. A French translation by Forbonnais, based on either the 2nd (1743) or 3rd (1748) edition, was published in 1753.

Thomas Babington Macaulay was born at Rothley Temple, Leicestershire in 1800. He was the son of the abolitionist Zachary Macaulay and his wife Selina (née Mills). He was educated at Trinity College Cambridge and subsequently studied law at Lincoln's Inn and was called to the bar in 1826. He first entered Parliament in 1830 as MP for Calne and subsequently for Leeds. He left Parliament in 1834 to serve on the Governor-General's Council in British India, returning to Britain in 1838. In 1839 he re-entered Parliament as MP for Edinburgh, keeping the seat until 1847 and spending several years as a cabinet minister. Macaulay was also known as a poet and author. Between 1839 and 1855 he wrote four volumes of a History of England, which was well-received by many critics. He was granted a peerage in 1857 and buried in Westminster Abbey after his death in 1859.

Henry Dunning Macleod was born in Edinburgh and educated at the Edinburgh Academy and at Eton before entering Trinity College, Cambridge. After graduating in 1843, he studied law at the Inner Temple and was called to the bar in 1849. From 1853 onwards he live mainly in London. Macleod's main interest was in political economy, on which he had strong and unorthodox views. He lectured occasionally at universities and wrote several works on economic and banking theory.

Richard Oastler was born in Leeds in 1789. After his business as a commission agent failed in 1820, he was appointed steward to Thomas Thornhill, an absentee Yorkshire squire. An opponent of slavery in the colonies, he began to campaign vigorously for improvements to the working conditions in British factories, and had some success in influencing legislation. He fell from prominence after the rise of Chartism in the early 1840s. He died in 1861.

Harry Price was born in January 1881 and educated in London and Shropshire. Between 1896 and 1898, Price founded the Carlton Dramatic Society and wrote small plays, and showed early interest in the unusual by experimenting with space-telegraphy between Telegraph Hill, Hatcham and Brockley. He also became interested in numismatics at an early age and was involved with archaeological excavations in Greenwich Park, London and Shropshire between 1902 and 1904 and in Pulborough, Sussex in 1909, culminating with his appointment as honorary curator of numismatics at Ripon Museum in 1904. He married Constance Mary Knight in August 1908.
Price's first major success in psychical research came in 1922 when he exposed the fraudulence of 'spirit' photographs taken by William Hope. During the same year, Price investigated his first séance with Willi Schneider at the home of Baron von Schrenck-Notzing in Munich and published The Revelations of a Spirit Medium. In 1923, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research was established in Bloomsbury and Price had his first sittings with mediums Stella C, Jean Guzik and Anna Pilch. Shortly after, he outlined a scheme for broadcasting experiments in telepathy for the BBC and, in 1925, was appointed foreign research officer to the American Society for Psychical Research, apposition he was to hold until 1931. In 1926, the National Laboratory of Psychical Research moved to new premises in Queensbury Place, South Kensington, and Price was to experience his first sittings with Rudi Schneider in Braunau-am-Inn, Austria, and to conduct his first experiments with Eleanore Zugun in Vienna. One year later, Price publically opened the 'box' of prophetess, Joanna Southcott at a Church Hall in Westminster.
In 1929, Rudi Schneider was brought to London for experiments into his mediumship and Price began his 10 year investigation of hauntings at Borley Rectory in Suffolk. Shortly after, the National Laboratory moved again to Roland Gardens in South Kensington. In 1932, Price, along with C.E.M.Joad, travelled to Mount Brocken in Germany to conduct a 'black magic' experiment in connection with the centenary of Goethe, involving the transformation of a goat into a young man. The following year, Price made a formal offer to the University of London to quip and endow a Department of Psychical Research, and to loan the equipment of the National Laboratory and its Library. The University of London Board of Studies in Psychology responded positively to this proposal and, in 1934, the University of London Council for Psychical Investigation was formed with Price as Honorary Secretary and Editor. Price's psychical research continued with investigations into Karachi's Indian rope trick and the fire-walking abilities of Kuda Bux in 1935. He was also involved in the formation of the National Film Library (British Film Institute) becoming its first chairman (until 1941) and was a founding member of the Shakespeare Film Society. In 1936, Price broadcast from a haunted manor house in Meopham, Kent for the BBC and published The Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter and The Haunting of Cashen's Gap. This year also saw the transfer of Price's library on permanent loan to the University of London, followed shortly by the laboratory and investigative equipment. In 1937, he conducted further televised experiments into fire-walking with Ahmed Hussain at Carshalton and Alexandra Palace, and also rented Borley Rectory for one year. The following year, Price re-established the Ghost Club, with himself as chairman, conducted experiments with Rahman Bey who was 'buried alive' in Carshalton and drafted a Bill for the regulation of psychic practitioners. In 1939, he organised a national telepathic test in the periodical John O'London's Weekly. During the 1940s, Price concentrated on writing and the works The Most Haunted House in England, Poltergeist Over England and The End of Borley Rectory were all published. He died in March 1948.

Publications: The Sceptic (psychic play), 1898; Coins of Kent and Kentish Tokens, 1902; Shropshire Tokens and Mints, 1902; Joint Editor, Revelations of a Spirit Medium, 1922; Cold Light on Spiritualistic Phenomena, 1922; Stella C.; An Account of Some Original Experiments in Psychical Research, 1925; Short-Title Catalogue of Works on Psychical Research, Spiritualism, Magic, etc. 1929; Rudi Schneider: A Scientific Examination of His Mediumship, 1930; Regurgitation and the Duncan Mediumship, 1931; An Account of Some Further Experiments with Rudi Schneider, 1933; Leaves from a Psychist's Case-book, 1933; Psychical Research (talking film), 1935; Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter, 1936; Faith and Fire-Walking, article in Encyclopædia Britannica, 1936; A Report on Two Experimental Fire-Walks, 1936; The Haunting of Cashen's Gap (with R. S. Lambert), 1936; Fifty Years of Psychical Research, 1939; The Most Haunted House in England: Ten Years' Investigation of Borley Rectory, 1940; Search for Truth: My Life for Psychical Research, 1942; Poltergeist over England, 1945; The End of Borley Rectory, 1946; film scenario of Borley hauntings (with Upton Sinclair), 1948; Works translated into eight languages; numerous pamphlets and contributions to British and foreign periodical literature.

George Webb Medley was the author of England under Free Trade (1881) and Fair trade unmasked: or notes on the minority report of the Royal Commission on the Depression of Trade and Industry (Cassell and Co., 1887). His other works include The German Bogey: A reply to "Made in Germany", (The Cobden Club, 1896) and The Reciprocity Craze (The Cobden Club, 1881).

The poem was written by the Chandos Herald, the domestic Herald of Sir John Chandos, who was a devoted friend and follower of Edward the Black Prince. Little is known of the life of the author, except that he accompanied Sir John Chandos in some of his later military campaigns, and was therefore in the position of eyewitness to the events he describes. The poem was composed about 1385, nine years after the death of Edward.