Herbert George Wells was born in Bromley, Kent, and educated locally. From the age of 13 he worked unsuccesfully as a draper's assistant and chemist's assistant, before beoming a pupil teacher Midhurst Grammar School. In 1884 he began studying under Thomas Huxley at the Normal School (later the Royal College) of Science in South Kensington, but left without a degree; he finally gained a University of London BSc in 1890. Wells became a teacher and freelance journalist before branching out into novels and short stories. He was married twice and had several other ongoing liaisons with women, including the writer Rebecca West (afterwards Dame Cicily Andrews). Today he is best known for his science fiction works, including The Time Machine (1895) and The War of the Worlds (1898); during his lifetime he was also known as a non-fiction writer and a committed socialist.
Sean O'Casey was born John Casey in Dublin in 1880. He joined the Gaelic League in 1906 with the intention of learning the Irish language, adopting the name Seán O'Cathasaigh, but later re-Anglicizing the surname as O'Casey. He also became involved in the Irish Transport and General Workers Union set up by Jim Larkin to represent unskilled workers and in 1914 became General Secretary of Larkin's Irish Citizens Army. He had several works performed at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin in the 1920s but after his play The Silver Tassle was rejected by the Abbey in 1929 he severed all links with the theatre. He then moved to England where he wrote Within the Gates in 1934, Purple Dust in 1940 and Red Roses for Me in 1953. He died of a heart attack in Torquay in 1964.
Raymond Wilson Chambers was born in Yorkshire in 1874. He was educated at the Grocers' Company's School and at University College London. He taught English Literature at University College form 1899 until his death in 1942. Chambers served as president of the Philological Society in 1933 and was honorary director of the Early English Text Society, 1938-1942.
Henry Crabb Robinson was born in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, and educated locally and in Devizes, Wiltshire. Being from a nonconformist family, he could not attend university, instead working as a legal clerk in Colchester, and later in London. Inheriting money from an uncle in 1798 enabled him to travel in Europe and study at university in Germany. Returning to England, he became a lawyer and a journalist, and for a while editor of The Times (1808-1809). He also participated in the founding of University College London. Today he is best known for his diary, kept between 1811 and his death in 1867, of which a large portion has been published.
Cartwright was the son of the Rev Edmund Cartwright (1743-1823), inventor of a power loom, and his first wife Alice (d 1758). He was the author of Parochial Topography of the Rape of Bramber (1830). His three sisters, Mary Strickland, Elizabeth Penrose and Frances Dorothy Cartwright, were also published writers.
John Ruskin was born in London in 1819. He was educated by his mother and various tutors before attending Oxford University. His study there was interrupted for two years by illness. He embarked upon a foreign tour with his parents in 1840. After resuming his education, he received his BA in 1842 and his MA in 1843. He taught art at Working Men's Colleges and at Oxford. While at Oxford he was appointed the first Slade Professor of Fine Art in 1869. During his life he wrote many books on art, social criticism and politics. In 1871 he purchased Brantwood near Coniston in the Lake District. Ruskin died of influenza in 1900.
(John) Frederick Denison Maurice was born in Suffolk into a Unitarian family. He was educated at Trinity College and Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and studied for the bar, but became a journalist instead of a lawyer. In the late 1820s his religious beliefs changed and he decided to become an Anglican clergyman. He studied at Exeter College, Oxford, before being ordained in 1834. Maurice was much involved with the theological issues and religious controversies of his day, and was known as a Christian socialist and for his views on hell and on the nature of divine revelation. He held a chair in casuistry, moral theology and moral philosophy at Cambridge from 1866 to 1869.
Henry John Pye was the son of the Poet Laureate Henry James Pye (1745-1813) and his second wife Martha. He married Mary Anne Walker in 1825 and they had 9 children, of whom the eldest, also Henry John Pye (1827-1903) became a clergyman and hymn-writer.
Henry Arthur Jones (1851-1929), British dramatist, was born at Grandborough, Buckinghamshire, England. He began working for a draper at the age of twelve, and later earned his living as a commerical traveller. After attending the theatre in London, he was inspired to begin writing one-act plays. His first play to be produced, It's Only Round the Corner, was staged at the Theatre Royal, Exeter, in 1878. His first London production, A Clerical Error, premiered the following year. The Silver King, which opened at the Princess Theatre, London, in 1882, established Jones's name as a dramatist. During his long career, he wrote numerous plays, among his most sucessful were The Middleman (1889), The Dancing Girl(1891), The Tempter (1893), The Triumph of the Philistines (1895), Michael and His Lost Angel (1896), The Liars (1897), and The Hypocrites (1906). Like the works of Arthur Wing Pinero, Jones's plays began the move away from melodrama and sentimental comedy to a more realistic treatment of social issues.
George Jacob Holyoake was born in Birmingham on 13 April 1817. For thirteen years until 1839 he worked at the Eagle Foundry, and in 1836 joined the Mechanics' Institute, where he developed an interest in arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and phrenology. Holyoake became a leader in the free-thought movement and a social reformer. He was imprisoned for 6 months in 1841 for blasphemy. He coined the term secularism in 1846. He spent the latter part of his life working for the co-operative movement. He died in 1906.
John Cartwright was born in Marnham, Nottinghamshire, in 1740. He served as a naval officer from 1758-1775, and was appointed as a Major in the Nottinghamshire militia in 1775. He published several works on political reform. His clergyman brother Edmund (1743-1823) became well known as the inventor of a power loom, and his niece, Frances Dorothy Cartwright (1780-1863) was his biographer.
John Ivatt Briscoe was MP for East Surrey from 1832 to 1835, and the owner of Radnor House, Twickenham, Middlesex, and Foxhills, Ottenshaw, Surrey. The politician Sir Joseph Mawbey was his father-in-law.
William Frend De Morgan was born in London in 1839. The second child of Augustus De Morgan (1806-1871) and his wife Sophia née Frend. He studied at University College London and the Royal Academy before working as a potter and designer of ceramics. In the 1900s he became a successful novelist.
William Ewart Gladstone was born in Liverpool in 1809, the youngest son of Sir John Gladstone, 1st Baronet (1764-1851). He was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, graduating in 1831 with a double first. He was elected to parliament in 1832 and served successively as MP for Newark, Oxford University, South Lancashire, Greenwich and Midlothian; intially he was a Conservative, but he joined the Liberal party in 1859. He was Chancellor of the Exchequer 4 times before serving as Prime Minister, also 4 times (1868-1874, 1880-1885, 1886 and 1892-1894). He tried twice unsuccessfully to introduce Home Rule in Ireland (1886 and 1893). His working relationship with Queen Victoria was famously difficult. Gladstone was much involved in efforts to 'rescue' and rehabilitate London prostitutes, and he read and wrote widely on religion, literature, economics and politics. In later life he was nicknamed 'Grand Old Man'.
Henry George Grey was born in Northumberland and educated privately and at Trinity College, Cambridge. He first entered parliament in 1826 and was successively MP for Winchelsea (Sussex), Higham Ferrers (Northamptonshire), Northumberland, and Sunderland. On his father's death in 1845, he entered the House of Lords as Earl Grey. He served as colonial secretary from 1846 until 1852. Grey was known as a supporter of free trade and continued to take a strong interest in British and colonial public affairs after leaving office. His nephew Albert succeded him as Earl Grey on his death in 1894.
George Augustus Moore was born in County Mayo, Ireland, in 1852. He was the eldest son of the politician George Henry Moore. He was educated at school in England before studying art in London and Paris. He inherited substantial Irish estates aged 18, when his father died in 1870, but the income from these reduced over the next few years and he began to make a living as a journalist and author in London. Much of his fiction was controversial, because of its treatment of religion and human sexuality. Between 1901 and 1911 Moore lived in Dublin, but spent most of his adult life living in England and France. He was brought up as a Roman Catholic, but publicly renounced this faith in middle age, having come to consider himself a protestant. He died in 1933.
Eden Phillpotts was born in India and educated in Plymouth, Devon. He spent several years working as an insurance officer before becoming a prolific novelist, playwright and poet. He was president of the Dartmoor Preservation Association for many years and a large proportion of his works are set on Dartmoor. His daughter Adelaide (1896-1993) also became a writer and collaborated with her father on several works, including the play 'Yellow Sands'.
John Ramsay McCulloch was born Whithorn, Wigtownshire, in 1789. He was a prolific Scottish journalist, and one of the most ardent expositors of the Classical Ricardian School of Economics. He was economics editor for the Whiggish Edinburgh Review, and used this platform to popularize Classical theories and promote the repeal of the Corn Laws. McCulloch was also the editor of the 1828 edition of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations and the 1846 edition of David Ricardo's Works, and composed some of the earliest accounts of the history of economic thought. His main work was Principles (1825), perhaps the first successful 'serious' textbook in economics. McCulloch served as a professor in political economy at University College London from 1828 to 1832. In the later part of his life, he became the Comptroller of HM Stationery Office. He died in 1864.
John Edward Masefield was born in Ledbury, Herefordshire in 1878. He entered the Merchant Navy and deserted ship in America, where he drifted for some time. Returning to England he became a journalist. He published several volumes of poetry before the outbreak of World War One. During the war Masefield was a member of the Red Cross and witnessed the disaster at Gallipoli, which he later wrote about in his position as head of the War Propaganda Bureau. During the 1920s and 1930s Masefield wrote numerous successful volumes of poetry, as well as two novels and an autobiography. Masefield continued to write until his death in 1967.
George Chalmers was born at Fochabers, Moray, Scotland, in 1742. He received his education from the parish school at Fochabers and from King's College Aberdeen. He went on to study law in Edinburgh and then in 1773 put these skills into practice as a lawyer in Baltimore, USA in 1773. He returned in 1775 to settle in London, where he devoted his life to writing books about Ireland, affairs of America and the British monarchy. In 1786 he was appointed chief clerk of the committee of the Privy Council for trade and foreign plantations. Chalmers wrote numerous biographies and in 1807 his first volume of Caledonia, a work intended to record the history and antiquities of Scotland was published. Volumes 2 and 3 of Caledonia were published in 1820 and 1824 but Chalmers died, on 31 May 1825, before he could finish the series although he left a manuscript collection intended for its completion. Chalmers was a prolific writer on history throughout his life as well as a collector of books and manuscripts. His library was sold in three parts between September 1841 and November 1842, yielding £6189 in total. Publications: An Answer from the Electors of Bristol to the Letter of Edmund Burke, Esq. on the affairs of America (T. Cadell, London, 1777); An Appeal to the Generosity of the British Nation, in a statement of facts on behalf of the afflicted widow and unoffending offspring of the unfortunate Mr. Bellingham (M. Jones, London, 1812); An Estimate of the Comparative Strength of Britain during the Present and Four Preceding Reigns; and of the losses of her trade from every war since the Revolution (C. Dilly and J. Bowen, London, 1782); An Introduction to the History of the Revolt of the Colonies (Baker and Galabin, London, 1782); Another Account of the Incidents, from which the title, and a part of the story of Shakspeare's Tempest, were derived; and the true era of it ascertained (R. & A. Taylor, London, 1815); Caledonia: or, an Account, historical and topographic, of North Britain; from the most ancient to the present times: with a dictionary of places, chorographical and philological (T. Cadell, London, 1807-24); Comparative Views of the State of Great Britain and Ireland; as it was, before the war; as it is, since the peace (T. Egerton, London, 1817); Considerations on Commerce, Bullion and Coin, Circulation and Exchanges; with a view to our present circumstances (J. J. Stockdale, London, 1811); Opinions of Eminent Lawyers, on various points of English Jurisprudence, chiefly concerning the Colonies, Fisheries, and Commerce, of Great Britain (Reed and Hunter, London, 1814); Opinions on Interesting Subjects of Public Law and Commercial Policy; arising from American independence (J. Debrett, London, 1784); Political Annals of the Present United Colonies, from their Settlement to the Peace of 1763 (J. Bowen, London, 1780); Proofs and Demonstrations, how much the projected Registry of Colonial Negroes is unfounded and uncalled for (Thomas Egerton: London, 1816); The Life of Daniel De Foe (John Stockdale, London, 1790); The Life of Mary, Queen of Scots; drawn from the State Papers(John Murray, London, 1818); The Life of Thomas Ruddiman (John Stockdale, London, 1794); Churchyard's Chips concerning Scotland: being a collection of his pieces relative to that country, with historical notices, and a life of the author (Longman & Co, London, 1817); A Collection of Treaties between Great Britain and other Powers (John Stockdale, London, 1790); Parliamentary Portraits (T. Bellamy, London, 1795); Facts and Observations relative to the coinage and circulation of counterfeit or base money; with suggestions for remedying the evil (London, 1795);The Arrangements with Ireland considered (John Stockdale, London, 1785); editor of The Poetical Works of Sir David Lyndsay (Longman, London, 1806); An Apology for the believers in the Shakspeare Papers [forged by W. H. Ireland], which were exhibited in Norfolk Street (T. Egerton, London, 1797); A short view of the proposals lately made for the final adjustment of the commercial system between Great-Britain and Ireland (John Stockdale, London, 1785); A Vindication of the privilege of the people, in respect to the constitutional right of free discussion, with a retrospect to various proceedings relative to the violations of that right (London, 1796); Thoughts on the present Crisis of our Domestic Affairs (London, 1807).
Henry Morley was born in London and educated at schools in England and Germany before studying medicine at King's College London. He worked as a doctor for some years before deciding to become a school teacher in the late 1840s. At the same time, he began a parallel career in journalism, initially writing on health issues. Between 1851 and 1865 he worked for Charles Dickens on the staff of Household Words and All the Year Round, and he was editor of The Examiner from 1861 to 1867. From 1857 Morley became involved in higher education, lecturing in English literature as part of the university extension movement and in 1865 he became a professor at University College London. He retired to the Isle of Wight in 1889, where he lived in Carisbrooke until his death in 1894.
John Fisher was born at Hampton, Middlesex, in 1748. He was educated in Peterborough and London before entering Peterhouse, Cambridge. He was ordained Deacon in the Church of England in 1771 and ordained Priest in 1773. He also became a Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge in 1773. From 1781-1785 Fisher became Chaplain to King George III and took charge of educating some of the royal children for several years. He became a Canon at Windsor in 1786, Bishop of Exeter in 1803, and Bishop of Salisbury in 1807. In 1819 he became a Fellow of the Royal Society. After his death in 1825, Fisher was buried in St George's Chapel, Windsor.
Cyril Edwin Mitchinson Joad was born in Durham and educated at Balliol College, Oxford. He joined the Fabian Society whilst still a student. After graduating, he joined the civil service and worked for the Board of Trade for more than 15 years; during this time he wrote many articles and reviews, and several books on philosophy. In 1930 he left the Board of Trade to become head of Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London, a position he held for many years. Joad's personal life was unconventional: he left his wife after 6 years of marriage and subsequently had many short-term relationships. His left-wing political views, support for divorce, abortion and Sunday trading, and opposition to war and religion made him controversial during his lifetime, though many of his views changed during the last 5 years of his life. He became well known to the public as a regular panellist on the BBC radio programme The Brains Trust.
John Viriamu Jones was born near Swansea in 1856. He was educated at University College, London, and Balliol College, Oxford. He became the first principal of the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire in 1883 and had a distinguished academic career as a physicist.
William Paton Ker was born in Glasgow in 1855. He studied at Glasgow Academy, Glasgow University and Balliol College, Oxford University. He became Professor of English Literature at the University College of South Wales, Cardiff in 1883 and in 1889 was appointed Professor of English Language and Literature at University College, London, where he set up an Honours School of English and organised the Department of Scandinavian Studies. He was appointed a fellowship at All Souls College, Oxford in 1879, and Chair of Poetry at Oxford in 1920.
Henry Rudolf (Harry) Reichel was born in Belfast and educated at Christ's Hospital and at Balliol College, Oxford. He became the first Principal of the University College of North Wales in 1884. He was knighted in 1907.
William Wordsworth was born in the Lake District in 1770. He was educated at Hawkshead grammar school, and St John's College, Cambridge University. In 1795 he moved, with his sister Dorothy, to Alfoxden House near Bristol, where they met Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey. Wordsworth and Southey embarked on a partnership which was to change the former's style of poetry from long poems of social protest to the short lyrical and dramatic poems for which he is best known. In 1798 Coleridge and Wordsworth published Lyrical Ballads. The Wordsworths and Coleridge moved to the Lake District, the former two moving into Dove Cottage in Ambleside. William married his childhood companion, Mary Hutchinson in 1802. He was made Poet Laureate in 1843, a post which he held until his death in 1850.
Gordon Bottomley was born in Yorkshire in 1874, and educated at Keighley Grammar School before becoming a bank clerk. Illness in his late teens forced him to give up work; subsequently spending long periods as an invalid, he took up writing. He was prolific and his theatrical works, including Gruach (1921), were often poetic and experimental.
Harriet Grote was born in Hampshire and educated at home. In 1820 she married George Grote, whom she had known for several years and who had introduced her to modern scholarship in the fields of politics, economics and philosophy. Mrs Grote was acquainted with Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, Thomas Babington Macaulay and other leading thinkers and scholars, and she and her husband became known as leading voices in radical politics. After her husband's death, she was his biographer. Harriet Grote's own biography was written by Elizabeth, Lady Eastlake (née Rigby), a copy of which is available in Senate House Library Special Collections - classmark: Fc [Grote - Eastlake].
Cecil Louis Troughton Smith was born in Egypt to British parents and educated in Britain before becoming a writer under the pseudonym C S Forester. After the Second World War he settled permanently in the United States. He is now best known as the author of The African Queen (1935) and a series of historical novels about a naval officer, Horatio Hornblower (1937-1962); both of these have become well known through film and television adaptations.
Oliver Elton was born in Norfolk in 1861. He was educated at Marlborough College and at Corpus Christi College, Oxford. He worked as a private tutor in London for several years before becoming a lecturer at the University of Manchester, 1890-1900, followed by a chair in English Literature at the University of Liverpool, 1901-1925. Elton's best known works are perhaps his 6-volume Survey of English Literature, covering 1730-1880, and for his translation of Puskin's Evgeny Onegin. His youngest son was the ecologist Charles Sutherland Elton.
George Chalmers was born at Fochabers, Moray, Scotland, in 1742. He received his education from the parish school at Fochabers and from King's College Aberdeen. He went on to study law in Edinburgh and then in 1773 put these skills into practice as a lawyer in Baltimore, USA in 1773. He returned in 1775 to settle in London, where he devoted his life to writing books about Ireland, affairs of America and the British monarchy. In 1786 he was appointed chief clerk of the committee of the Privy Council for trade and foreign plantations. Chalmers wrote numerous biographies and in 1807 his first volume of Caledonia, a work intended to record the history and antiquities of Scotland was published. Volumes 2 and 3 of Caledonia were published in 1820 and 1824 but Chalmers died, on 31 May 1825, before he could finish the series although he left a manuscript collection intended for its completion.
Chalmers was a prolific writer on history throughout his life as well as a collector of books and manuscripts. His library was sold in three parts between September 1841 and November 1842, yielding £6189 in total. Publications: An Answer from the Electors of Bristol to the Letter of Edmund Burke, Esq. on the affairs of America (T. Cadell, London, 1777); An Appeal to the Generosity of the British Nation, in a statement of facts on behalf of the afflicted widow and unoffending offspring of the unfortunate Mr. Bellingham (M. Jones, London, 1812); An Estimate of the Comparative Strength of Britain during the Present and Four Preceding Reigns; and of the losses of her trade from every war since the Revolution (C. Dilly & J. Bowen, London, 1782); An Introduction to the History of the Revolt of the Colonies (Baker & Galabin, London, 1782); Another Account of the Incidents, from which the title, and a part of the story of Shakspeare's Tempest, were derived; and the true era of it ascertained (R. & A. Taylor, London, 1815); Caledonia: or, an Account, historical and topographic, of North Britain; from the most ancient to the present times: with a dictionary of places, chorographical and philological (T. Cadell, London, 1807-24); Comparative Views of the State of Great Britain and Ireland; as it was, before the war; as it is, since the peace (T. Egerton, London, 1817); Considerations on Commerce, Bullion and Coin, Circulation and Exchanges; with a view to our present circumstances (J. J. Stockdale, London, 1811); Opinions of Eminent Lawyers, on various points of English Jurisprudence, chiefly concerning the Colonies, Fisheries, and Commerce, of Great Britain (Reed and Hunter, London, 1814); Opinions on Interesting Subjects of Public Law and Commercial Policy; arising from American independence (J. Debrett, London, 1784); Political Annals of the Present United Colonies, from their Settlement to the Peace of 1763 (J. Bowen, London, 1780); Proofs and Demonstrations, how much the projected Registry of Colonial Negroes is unfounded and uncalled for (Thomas Egerton: London, 1816); The Life of Daniel De Foe (John Stockdale, London, 1790); The Life of Mary, Queen of Scots; drawn from the State Papers(John Murray, London, 1818); The Life of Thomas Ruddiman (John Stockdale, London, 1794); Churchyard's Chips concerning Scotland: being a collection of his pieces relative to that country, with historical notices, and a life of the author (Longman & Co, London, 1817); A Collection of Treaties between Great Britain and other Powers (John Stockdale, London, 1790); Parliamentary Portraits (T. Bellamy, London, 1795); Facts and Observations relative to the coinage and circulation of counterfeit or base money; with suggestions for remedying the evil (London, 1795);The Arrangements with Ireland considered (John Stockdale, London, 1785); editor of The Poetical Works of Sir David Lyndsay (Longman, London, 1806); An Apology for the believers in the Shakspeare Papers [forged by W. H. Ireland], which were exhibited in Norfolk Street (T. Egerton, London, 1797); A short view of the proposals lately made for the final adjustment of the commercial system between Great-Britain and Ireland (John Stockdale, London, 1785); A Vindication of the privilege of the people, in respect to the constitutional right of free discussion, with a retrospect to various proceedings relative to the violations of that right (London, 1796); Thoughts on the present Crisis of our Domestic Affairs (London, 1807).
Samuel Heywood was born in Liverpool in 1753. He was educated at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, where his Unitarian religious views prevented him from graduating. He subsequently studied law at the Inner Temple; he was called to the bar in 1778, was made a serjeant-at-law in 1794, and became a judge on the Carmarthen circuit in 1807. One of very few religious dissenters to hold a national public office at this time, he was a strong Whig supporter and a fierce opponent of the Anglican hegemony, particularly its more high church elements.
William Wilberforce was born in Hull, Yorkshire in 1759. He was educated locally and in London, and at St John's College, Cambridge. He was elected Tory MP for Hull in 1780, aged 21, and later served as MP for Yorkshire and for Bramber (Sussex). Whilst in office, he campaigned heavily for the abolition of the slave trade, eventually succeeding in 1807.
Florence Farr was born in 1860. She was the youngest daughter of Mary Elizabeth Whittal and Dr William Farr, a sanitary reformer and advocator of equal education and professional rights for women. She was educated at Queen's College London (1877-1880), received good reports but had no inclination to prepare for higher education. After an unsuccessful attempt at teaching (1880-1882), Farr gravitated to the theatre, appearing in minor parts and adopting the stage name, Mary Lester. In 1883 her father died, leaving her a sufficient amount to live on modestly. Her first novel The Dancing Fawn was published in 1894. That same year she became theatre producer at the Avenue Theatre, producing modern plays. Farr preached about parity for women in employment, wages etc. amongst her intellectual circle of acquaintances. George Bernard Shaw wrote that she reacted vehemently against Victorian sexual and domestic morality and was dauntless in publicly championing unpopular causes such as campaigning for the welfare of prostitutes. Farr had a fascination for the occult, Egyptology and theosophy. She conducted hermetic studies and belonged to an order of like-minded folk, The Hermetic Order of Isis-Urania Temple of The Golden Dawn of London. She published her first philosophical tracts, A Short Inquiry concerning the Hermetic Art by a Lover of Philatethes in 1894. In 1901, Florence, with a friend of Yeat's, collaborated in the writing and production of two one act plays, both recounting Egyptian magical tales. Farr later quit The Golden Dawn and joined the Theosophical Society of London. Farr cultivated friendships with 'clever men'. Among her friends and correspondents were William and May Morris, George Bernard Shaw, John Quinn, Henry Paget, Dr John Todhunter and W B Yeats. In 1884 she married an actor, Mr Edward Emery (b 1863). They separated in 1888 when Mr Emery immigrated to America, according to Shaw, on account of 'some trouble (not domestic)'. Shaw wrote that Florence (who used her own surname more often than her husband's) was quite content with this situation and considered it of little importance. In 1895 she finally divorced Edward Emery on Shaw's advice. In the 1890s, Yeats used Farr's 'golden voice' as part of his quest to encourage the rebirth of spoken poetry. In 1898 made her the stage manager for his Irish Literary Theatre and she became a regular contributor to the performance of his metrical plays. She was also involved in the performance and musical composition of a number of plays at the Lyceum and Court Theatre and New Century Theatres in London, 1902-1906. In 1912, Farr sailed from England for a life in Ceylon. She had been invited by Sri Ponnambalam Ramanthan, a fellow theosophist, to teach at his newly founded College for Girls in Ceylon. As Lady Principal she supervised the teachers, care of sick children, servants and general administration. In 1917, Florence Farr died in Colombo General Hospital at the age of 56. Her body was cremated at the home of Ramanathan. In 1912 she left some of her correspondence with Clifford Bax in a locked black box only to be opened after her death. They were later published in Florence Farr, Bernard Shaw and W B Yeats by C Bax (ed.), The Cuala Press (1941). In preface to these letters Bax wrote that they 'show that she had too much personality to become a good actress' and were testament to her good humour. He described her as 'a woman who could inspire remarkable men' and predicted that she would be remembered primarily on account of her private friendships with eminent intellectuals of the time.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
Edward Hawkins was born in Macclesfield, Cheshire, and educated locally and in Kensington. As a young man he worked in banks in Cheshire and in Wales. He was interested in botany and history from an early age and became a Fellow of the Linnean Society in 1806, a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1821, and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 1826. His greatest interests as a scholar, however, was coins; he was a founder-member of the Numismatic Society of London and served twice as its president. In 1825 Hawkins became assistant keeper of the Department of Antiquities at the British Museum; he was promoted to keeper the following year and retained the position for 35 years.
William Henry Davies was born into a working class family in Monmouthshire, in 1871. He was brought up by his grandparents. He travelled in North America for several years as a young man, where his right leg was partly amputated after a railway accident. Subsequently, Davies lived and worked in London, writing poetry and several novels. His work was acclaimed by several of his leading contemporaries, including Arthur Symons and George Bernard Shaw; Shaw wrote the preface to Davies's autobiography.
John Yates was born in Bolton, in 1755. He became a Unitarian minister in Liverpool and was noted for his support of radical politics and opposition to slavery. He married Elizabeth Bostock, a doctor's widow, and they had eight children. His eldest son, Joseph Brooks Yates, became a well-known businessman and antiquary, and his fourth son, James Yates, followed him into the Unitarian ministry.
James Yates was born in Liverpool and educated at the Universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh, and at Manchester College in York. Like his father, John Yates, he became a Unitarian minister (though unordained), working in Glasgow, Birmingham and London. He was also known as a scholar, active in diverse fields including geology, archaeology and classical philology.
Tenney Frank was born in Kansas in 1876. He was educated at the University of Kansas and the University of Chicago, receiving his PhD from the latter in 1903. He was Professor of Latin for many years at Bryn Mawr College and subsequently Johns Hopkins University. Frank's research into Roman history and classical literature was influential. He died in Oxford, England in 1939.
John Chapman was born in Ruddington, near Nottingham, in 1821. He became an apprentice watchmaker, and attended the local Pestalozzian Institute where he heard lectures advocating political reform. In 1842 he studied medicine in Paris and practised as a surgeon, before purchasing a London publishing business in 1844. In 1857 he qualified as a physician and practised medicine alongside his publishing and literary work. He was the owner and editor of the Westminster Review (1851-1860).
Thomas Bernard was born in Lincolnshire in 1750. He was brought up partly in North America, where his father was colonial governor of Massachusetts, and educated at school in New Jersey and at Harvard University. Returning to England as a young man, he studied law at the Middle Temple and was called to the bar in 1780. Bernard gained a fortune through his legal career and marriage to an heiress and devoted much of his life to philanthropy. He was a governor and treasurer of the London Foundling Hospital and much concerned with improving the conditions of child labourers. He was active in the debate over poor law reform and campaigned against the tax on salt. Much of his work was driven by his evangelical Christian beliefs. Bernard succeeded his brother to the baronetcy in 1810. After his death in 1818 he was buried beneath the Foundling Hospital chapel. His nephew, the Rev James Baker, was his biographer. The author Frances Elizabeth King was his sister.
Michel Chevalier was born in Limoges in 1806. He was educated at the École Polytechnique in Paris. From 1830 to 1832 he was editor of the Saint-Simonian newspaper Le Globe, and was imprisoned for 6 months after the group and newspaper were banned. In the late 1830s his career in industry became successful. He became Professor of Political Economy at the Collège de France aged 35. Later in life, Chevalier became a politician: he was elected a député for Aveyron in 1845 and appointed a senator in 1860. He was also one of the architects of the Cobden-Chevalier free-trade treaty between France and the United Kingdom. He died in Montpellier in 1879.
Claude-Henri, comte de Saint-Simon, was born into a French aristocratic family and received a scientific education. After the age of 40 he began to write extensively on political, industrial and religious topics. His Christian-influenced socialist views were not very influential during his lifetime, but but gained many adherents (known as Saint-Simonians) during the period 1828-1832 before the movement was banned by the French government as a dangerous sect. Today, Saint-Simon is considered the father of French socialism.
Henry Peter Brougham was born and educated in Edinburgh and practised as a lawyer in Scotland and England. He served as Whig MP for Camelford (1810-1812), Winchelsea (1815-1830), Knaresborough (1830) and Yorkshire (1830) before receiving a peerage. He was Lord Chancellor from 1830-1834.
Charles Jenkinson (1727-1808) became private secretary to the 3rd Earl of Bute, favourite of George III, in 1760. In 1763, having been elected to Parliament, Jenkinson was appointed Joint Secretary of the Treasury. Chosen as Vice-Treasurer for Ireland in 1773, he became a member of the Privy Council. Later he was Master of the Royal Mint (1775-1778) and, during the American Revolution, Secretary at War (1778-1782). During the first ministry (from 1783) of the William Pitt the younger, Jenkinson proved an invaluable adviser. In 1786 he was appointed chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster and president of the Board of Trade. A member of the Cabinet from 1791, he became an invalid around 1801, ceased to attend Cabinet meetings, and by the middle of 1804 had resigned all his offices. He was created Baron Hawkesbury in 1786 and 1st Earl of Liverpool in 1796.
Thomas Clarkson was born in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire, in 1760. He was educated locally and in London before entering St John's College Cambridge. Whilst researching for an essay competition in 1785, he was appalled to discover the cruelty involved in the Atlantic slave trade and became an abolitionist. Along with his younger brother John, he researched and campaigned vigorously on behalf of the anti-slavery movement. After the Abolition Act was passed in 1807, he continued to campaign for its enforcement and for emancipation of those already enslaved (achieved in 1833). Brought up in the Church of England, Clarkson became close to many Quaker friends that he met through the anti-slavery movement but did not join the Society of Friends himself.
Henry Tolcher was born in Plymouth and spent most of his life in the town. He qualified as a goldsmith in 1711 and became a freeman of Plymouth in 1721. Subsequently he held several public offices, including becoming Lord Mayor of Plymouth in 1738 and 1768.
Mary Anne Evans was born and educated in Warwickshire. She left school aged 16 when her mother died and became her father's housekeeper for several years. In her early 20s she met Charles and Cara Bray and their freethinking, progressive and radical friends; her reading and social contacts led her to reject the evangelical Christian faith of her upbringing and schooling and adversely affected her relationships with her father and her brother Isaac. Following her father's death Marian (as she began to spell her name) moved to London to become a journalist, where she became close friends with the publisher John Chapman and the sociologist Herbert Spencer. Her most important relationship, however, was with the critic George Henry Lewes, with whom she lived as his partner between 1853 and his death in 1878; their love affair was controversial not only because Lewes was married to (but separated from) another woman, but because they were living 'in sin' openly. Marian began writing fiction in the late 1850s; over the next 20 years she became recognized as one of Britain's greatest novelists and is still considered as such today. Her works included Adam Bede, The Mill on the Floss and Middlemarch.
Marian used several different names during the course of her life: she was born Mary Anne Evans, but adopted the spelling Mary Ann in early adulthood, before deciding to call herself Marian Evans (the most commonly cited form of her name) in 1850; despite not being married to Lewes, she often used his surname whilst they they lived together. To her readers, however, she is George Eliot, a pseudonym she chose so that her writing would not be prejudged as that of a woman (particularly not that of the notoriously 'immoral' Marian Evans Lewes). Her final name change came late in life when a few months before her death she became Mary Ann Cross on her marriage to John Walter Cross. Although a great writer, her personal history and lack of Christian faith made a burial in Westminster Abbey unsuitable, and she was buried beside Lewes in Highgate cemetery.
Thomas Henry Hall Caine was born in Cheshire and educated in Liverpool before being apprenticed to an architect. In his late teens he taught on the Isle of Man for a year, and on returning to Liverpool began to work as a journalist as well as an architectural draughtsman. He began corresponding with Dante Gabriel Rossetti in 1879 and through him was introduced to London literary society. His first novel was published in 1885 and he became very popular as an author: The Christian (1897) was the first British novel to sell more than one million copies. His Christian faith and radical political opinions were strong influences on his work. In 1895 Caine returned to the Isle of Man, where he and his family took up permanent residence; he served as a member of the House of Keys for several years. He was knighted in 1918 (disliking his first name, he preferred to be called Sir Hall rather than Sir Thomas) and became a Companion of Honour in 1922. His Life of Christ, for which he had hoped to be remembered, was published posthumously in 1937.
Michel Chasles studied at the École Polytechnique in Paris and later held professorships there and at the Sorbonne. He became a leading figure in the field of geometry and was awarded the Copley Medal in 1865.