Dr Bruce Barker-Benfield is a librarian in the Special Collections and Western Manuscripts department at the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford.
Alexander Dumaresq Bennett was born, 1887; 2 Lt, 1906; Indian Army, 1907; Lt, 1908; Capt, 1915; Maj, 1921; Lt-Col, 1932; retired, [1938]; died 1975.
Edward Claude Pine-Coffin was born, 1895; commissioned in India 1915; Colonel in the 14 Punjabi Regiment; died 1978.
John Trenchard Pine Coffin was born, 1921; Royal Military Academy Sandhurst; joined Devonshire Regiment, 1939; Kings African Rifles, serving in North Africa and Burma; returned to UK and joined the Parachute Regiment, service in Germany, Cyprus, Egypt and the Suez Campaign; Staff Officer, Joint Headquarters, Nassau; retired from the Army, 1969; High Sheriff of Devon, 1974; died 2006.
No information available at present.
Born in North Staffordshire, 1867; educated at Middle School, Newcastle under Lyme; joined his father's office in order to finish preparing for matriculation at the University of London and to study for a law degree which he was never to complete, 1885; left Staffordshire to become clerk at a firm of London solicitors, 1888-1893; also worked as a freelance journalist and wrote several novels and short stories, becoming assistant editor of the weekly journal Woman, 1893; editor, 1896; lived in Paris, 1902-1912; wrote plays, romances, articles and novels; married Marie Marguerite Soulié, a Frenchwoman, 1907; returned to England, 1912; during World War One, became a public servant, serving on the War Memorials and Wounded Allies Relief Committee and as head of propaganda in France, 1914-1918; whilst in France, wrote on conditions at the front; after the war, published several novels and contributed articles to the Evening Standard newspaper; separated from his wife, 1921; in 1922 began to live with Dorothy Cheston, who was regarded as his second wife and changed her name to Bennett; had a daughter, Virginia Mary, 1926; after a trip to France, returned to London ill with typhoid fever and died, 1931. Publications include: novels, most famously Anna of the five towns (1902), The Old Wives' Tale (1908) and Clayhanger (1911), all set in the Potteries; and many stage plays.
Enoch Arnold Bennett was born in Staffordshire on 27 May 1867. In 1885 he joined his father's office in order to finish preparing for matriculation at the University of London and to study for a law degree which he never completed. In 1888 he left Staffordshire to become a clerk at a firm of London solicitors. After working as a freelance journalist and writing several novels and short stories, Bennett in 1893 became the assistant editor, later editor (1896) of the weekly journal Woman. At the end of 1902 Bennett left England for Paris. While in Paris Bennett continued to write. He remained in Paris until 1912, when he returned to England.
During World War One, 1914-1918, Bennett became a public servant, serving on the War Memorials and Wounded Allies Relief Committee and head of propaganda in France. Whilst in France Bennett wrote on the conditions at the front. After the war Bennett published several novels and contributed articles to the Evening Standard newspaper. After a trip to France, he returned to London in January 1931, ill with typhoid fever. Bennett died on 27 March 1931.
George Bennett was born in Plymouth, in 1804. He visited Ceylon and Mauritius in 1819. When he returned to England, he studied medicine in Plymouth and London, and entered the Middlesex Hospital and the Windmill Street School, where his masters were Charles Bell, Herbert Mayo, and Caesar Hawkins. After qualifying he went to New Zealand, and studied coniferous trees including the Thuja pine, the Kawaka of the Maoris. He also found a live Pearly Nautilus in 1829, and sent the unique specimen to his friend Richard Owen, at that time assistant to William Clift at the Royal College of Surgeons' Museum. Owen to wrote a brilliant description of it which was published in 1882. In the Asiatic Journal, he published an account of the Polynesian dialects and of the practice of medicine. Bennett visited Java, Sumatra, Singapore, and China after leaving Australia, and embodied his observations in his well-known work, The Wanderings of a Naturalist in New South Wales, Batavia, Pedir Coast, Singapore and China, published in two volumes by Bentley in 1834. In 1834 he was awarded the Honorary Gold Medal by the Royal College of Surgeons for his discovery of the Pearly Nautilus and for preparations illustrating the developmental history of the kangaroo and ornithorhyncus (platypus). He was elected a Corresponding Member of the Zoological Society of London in 1832. The Zoological Society awarded him its Silver Medal in 1862. Bennett settled in New South Wales after 1834, and began to practise in Sydney in 1836 in order to add to the income (£1OO per annum) derived from the Secretaryship of the Australian Museum Committee, to which he was appointed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies on the advice of the President of the Royal College of Surgeons and other College authorities. He published his best-known book Gatherings of a Naturalist (1860). It is a store-house of facts as to the natural and general history of Australia. He was appointed an Associate and a Member of the Committee of the Biological Section of the British Association (Aberdeen) in 1859, and held the same positions at the Oxford (1860) and Plymouth (1877) Meetings. He was elected a Member of the Board of Examiners in the Faculty of Medicine in the University of Sydney in 1856, and three years later Professor Harvey dedicated to him Volume II of his Phytologia Australica. In 1860 he was appointed a Member of the Imperial Australian Zoological and Botanical Society. An Acclimatization Society having been formed in Sydney in 1861, he delivered a lecture on 'Acclimatization and its Adaptation to Australia', which was afterwards published by the Melbourne Acclimatization Society and largely distributed in Sydney. He was Honorary Secretary of the Sydney Acclimatization Society from 1868-1871. At the end of his tenure of office a long correspondence was carried on with the Government of India on the subject of the cultivation of silk, and that portion of it which related to New South Wales was published by the Government (1870). Bennett also corresponded with Japan on the same subject, and was sent full information and a collection of choice eggs to found an Australian silk-worm industry. He became a member of the Imperial Society of Cherbourg in 1864 and a corresponding member of the Royal Society of Tasmania. In 1871 he began a search for fossil mammalia and reptilia and discovered many important new specimens in the Queensland drifts. Bennett was awarded the Silver Medal of the Acclimatization Society of Victoria in 1878 in recognition of his services in their cause, and in 1874 he was appointed Honorary Consulting Physician to St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney. He took a trip to Europe in 1877, travelling via North America, and returned in 1879 via Bombay and Ceylon. During this visit he was elected Corresponding Member of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Liverpool, Honorary Member of the Geographical Society of Rome, Fellow of the Royal Colonial Institute, and Honorary Corresponding Secretary. He acted as Executive Commissioner representing the Ceylon Government at the Sydney International Exhibition (1879-1880), and in 1882 was elected President of the New South Wales Zoological Society. In 1888 he was elected President of the Natural History Association, and was re-elected in 1891, when the Society was re-named the Field Naturalists' Society of New South Wales. In this year he presented a stained glass window to the Medical School of Sydney University. The Clarke Memorial Medal of the Royal Society (NSW), awarded 'for Meritorious Contributions to the Geology, Mineralogy, or Natural History of Australia to men of science, whether resident in Australia or elsewhere', was bestowed upon him in 1890, and the same year he bequeathed scientific works to the value of over £2000 to the Library of Sydney University. The gift included the valuable works of John Gould, with whom he had been much associated, and whom, with many other leading naturalists, such as Cumming, he often mentions in his letters. For the last ten years of his life Bennett took little active part in the work of his profession, though he continued to act as Co-examiner in Materia Medica and Therapeutics at the University, subjects in which he had always been greatly interested. He died in 1898.
William Sterndale Bennett founded the Bach Society in 1849, as part of the growing interest in the music of Johann Sebastian Bach in England in the nineteenth century known as the 'Bach revival'. Bennett had had a brilliant early career as a pianist and composer, which included a friendship with Felix Mendelssohn begun in 1836, himself a renowned promoter and perfomer of Bach's music. The first meeting of the Society, on 27 October 1849, at Bennett's house in Russell Place, formulated the objects of the society, which included the collection and promotion, but not publication, of the works of Bach (though the society did publish a volume of the motets, with English text added, in 1851). A number of concerts were given, and at last the St Matthew Passion had its first English performance (with English words) at the Hanover Square Rooms on 6 April 1854, Bennett conducting. Several other important works were revived before the society disbanded in 1870. Charles Steggall (1826-1905), the organist and composer, was a pupil of William Sterndale Bennett at the Royal Academy of Music, 1847-1851, and was also Secretary of the Bach Society throughout its existence. He edited an edition of Bach's motets for the Society (1851).
Born 1949; educated Sedgehill School, Polytechnic of North London (BA), Institute of Education (PGCE), and University of Sussex (MA); worked in educational publishing, 1974; Schoolmaster, 1976-1985; Conservative Councillor, London Borough of Lewisham, 1974-1982; contested St Pancreas North, 1973, Greenwich by-election, 1974, and GLC elections (Hackney Council), 1979; Member of Education Committee, Inner London Education Authority, 1978-1981; Conservative MP for Pembroke, 1987-1992; Member, Select Committee on Welsh Affairs, 1987-1990, and the Select Committee on Procedure, 1988-1990; Parliamentary Private Secretary to Minister of State, Department of Transport, 1990; Vice Chairman (Wales), Conservative Backbench Party Organisation Committee, 1990; Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Welsh Office, 1990-1992; contested Pembroke, 1992, and Reading West, 1997; Member, Further Education Funding Council for England (FEFCE), 1992-1997; Advisor on public affairs, Price Waterhouse, 1993-1998; JP, South West Division, Inner London; Chief Executive, Association of Consulting Engineers, 1998-present.
Arthur Christopher Benson was born in Berkshire in 1862; educated at Eton College and at King's College, Cambridge, from which he graduated with a first in 1884. He taught at Eton for 18 years before becoming a fellow of Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he lived from 1904 until his death in 1925; he became master of Magdalene in 1915. Benson's father, Edward White Benson, became Archbishop of Canterbury, and several of his sibling were known as writers and scholars. Arthur Christopher Benson is perhaps best remembered today as the author of the words to 'Land of Hope and Glory'.
Born in 1903; educated at Cheltenham College and Royal Military Academy, Woolwich; 2nd Lt, Royal Field Artillery, 1923; Lt, 1925; ADC to Government United Provinces, 1929-1931; Capt, 1936; Adjutant, 1936-1938; General Staff Officer Grade 3, 1939-1940; Maj, 1940; Brig, 1942; served in North West Europe, 1944-1946; Col, 1946; Deputy Director, Military Government (British Element), Berlin, 1948-1950; Maj Gen, 1951; Commander, 4 Anti-Aircraft Group, 1951-1953; Chief of Staff, General HQ, Middle East Land Forces, 1954-1957; retired, 1957; Col Commandant, Royal Artillery, 1960-1965; died in 1985.
Born 1859; educated Bedford College, 1879-1880; gained BSc at University College London, 1891; Fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge University, 1892-1893, gaining a DSc in 1894; Head of the Botany Department, Royal Holloway College, University of London, 1893-1922; Professor of Botany, Royal Holloway College, 1912-1922; Examiner in Honours Internal BSc, London; Member of Faculty of Science, University of London, 1903; Fellow of University College London; Fellow of Linnean Society, 1905; died 1936.
Publications: various articles in Annals of Botany.
Mary Benson was born on 8 December 1919 in Pretoria, South Africa and was educated there and in Great Britain. Before the Second World War she was a secretary in the High Commission Territories Office of the British High Commission in South Africa. Between 1941-1945 she joined the South African women's army, rising to the rank of Captain and serving as Personal Assistant to various British generals in Egypt and Italy.
After the war she joined UNRRA and then became personal assistant to the film director David Lean. In 1950 she became secretary to Michael Scott and first became involved in the field of race relations. In 1951 she became secretary to Tshekedi Khama, and in 1952, together with Scott and David Astor, she helped to found the Africa Bureau in London. She was its secretary until 1957 and travelled widely on its behalf. In 1957 she became secretary to the Treason Trials Defence Fund in Johannesburg. She became a close friend of Nelson Mandela, and assisted with smuggling him out of South Africa in 1962. In February 1966 she was served with a banning order under the Suppression of Communism Act and she left South Africa for London later that year.
In London she continued to work tirelessly against apartheid, writing to newspapers and corresponding with fellow activists in South Africa. In April 1999 Mandela visited her at her home during his state visit to Britain and later that year an 80th birthday party was staged for her at South Africa House.
Mary Benson died on 20 June 2000.
Among her writings are South Africa: the Struggle for a Birthright, Chief Albert Luthuli, The History of Robben Island, Nelson Mandela: the Man and the Movement, the autobiographical A Far Cry and radio plays on Mandela and the Rivonia trial.
Mary Benson was born in South Africa in 1919. After a period spent travelling in Europe and the United States she enlisted in the South African Women's Army as a Personal Assistant and was sent to the Middle East, Italy, Greece and Austria. Following the War she became secretary to the film director, David Lean. On reading Alan Paton's Cry, the Beloved Country in 1948, she became friendly with the author and determined to involve herself more fully in South African politics. From 1950-1956 she assisted the radical Anglican priest, Rev. Michael Scott and helped to found the African Bureau in London. In 1957, Mary Benson became Secretary of the Treason Trials Defence Fund. Her biography of Tshekedi Khama was published in 1960 and then in 1963 The African Patriots: The Story of the African National Congress of South Africa. In May 1963 she became the first South African to testify at the Committee on Apartheid at the United Nations, risking imprisonment on her return by calling for sanctions. In February 1966 she was banned and placed under house arrest until she went into exile later that spring.
Mary Benson's other writings include a novel, At the Still Point (1969), South Africa: The Struggle for a Birthright (an update of African Patriots) (1966), and Nelson Mandela (1986). She also edited Athol Fugard's Notebooks (1983) and has written a number of radio plays.
Born in 1889; educated at Eton College and Oxford University; joined 9 Lancers, 1909; ADC to Viceroy of India, 1913-1914; Adjutant, 9 Lancers, 1914-1915; 1 Canadian Div, France, 1916; 59 (North Midland) Div, Ireland, 1916; Cavalry Corps, France, 1916; General Staff Officer Grade 3, Central Home Defence and British Armies in France, 1916-1917; General Staff Officer Grade 2, 1917-1919; Liaison Officer, British Military Mission, Groupe des Armées du Nord, 1917-1918; Liaison Officer, British Military Mission, Grand Quartier Général, 1918; Military Secretary to Governor of Bombay, 1921-1922; served in France Army, 1939-1940; Military Attaché, Washington, USA, 1941-1944; died in 1968.
Born, Shropshire, 1892; suffered poor health and as a child travelled to Switzerland and the West Indies; worked briefly with the suffragette movement, 1914; during the war involved in social work for eighteen months in Hoxton, London, later on the land; went to California, 1918; sailed for England via the Far East, 1920; married James Carew Gorman Anderson of the Chinese customs service, 1921; based in Hong Kong after her marriage and campaigned against licensed prostitution; published novels, short stories and articles, 1915-1931, including Tobit Transplanted (1931) awarded Femina Vie Heureuse Prize, 1932; died, 1933.
Publications: include: I Pose (Macmillan and Co, London, 1915); This is the End (Macmillan and Co, London, 1917); Twenty [Poems] (Macmillan and Co, London, 1918); Living Alone (Macmillan and Co, London, 1919); The Poor Man (Macmillan and Co, London, 1922); The Awakening. A fantasy (Printed by Edwin and Robert Grabhorn for the Lantern Press, San Francisco, 1925); The Little World (Macmillan and Co, London, 1925); Goodbye, Stranger (Macmillan and Co, London, 1926); The Man who Missed the 'Bus (Mathews and Marrot, London, 1928); Worlds within Worlds [Sketches of travel] (Macmillan and Co, London, 1928); The Far-away Bride [With an appendix containing the Book of Tobit, from the Apocrypha] (Harper and Bros, New York and London, 1930); Tobit Transplanted (Macmillan and Co, London, 1931); Christmas Formula, and other stories (William Jackson [Joiner and Steele], London, 1932); Collected Short Stories (Macmillan and Co, London, 1936.
James Theodore Bent; born Baildon, Yorkshire, 1852; educated at Malvern Wells, Repton School and Wadham College Oxford (BA 1875); married 1877 Mabel Virginia Anna, daughter of Robert Hall-Dare. Between 1877 and 1897 the Bents travelled extensively in Greece, Italy, Turkey, Russia, India the Persian Gulf, Central Africa, Abyssinia and the Arabian peninsula. Bent died in London in 1897, from pneumonia following on malarial fever, which developed after his return from Aden.
Publications: Theodore Bent:The Life of Garibaldi, 1881; The Cyclades, or Life amomg the Insular Greeks, 1885; The Ruined Cities of Mashonaland, 1892; The Sacred City of the Ethiopians, 1893; articles in the Archaeological Journal, the Journal of Hellenic Studies, the Journal of the Anthropological Institute. Mabel Bent: Southern Arabia, 1900 (contains extensive material from Theodore Bent's journals).
No information was available at the time of compilation.
George Bentham was born on 22 September 1800 at Stoke, near Portsmouth. His father was the well-known naval architect Samuel Bentham. His mother was the daughter of Dr. George Fordyce, F.R.S., and an amateur botanist. In 1805 his father was sent to St. Petersburg by the English government, where the family resided until 1807. At this time George became fluent in Russian, French and German, showing his great aptitude for languages. The family returned to England for a time, and then moved to France in 1814, where they would reside for the next twelve years. Bentham never attended school in his youth, being educated at home by his mother and private tutors.
Bentham studied at the Protestant Theological College for two years beginning 1818, when the family lived in Montauban, S W France. It was during this time that his intense interest in botany developed, prompted by a study of de Candolles' edition of Lamarck's Flore francaise. Bentham was fascinated by the analytical tables for the determination of plants in the book, which fell in with the methodical and tabulating ideas he acquired while studying the works of his uncle, the philosopher and jurist Jeremy Bentham, and greatly influenced his bias towards Classificatory Botany. Bentham began frequent excursions to the French countryside to collect plants which he would then preserve and classify, forming the start of what would become his extensive herbarium. In late 1820 Samuel Bentham purchased an estate near Montpellier and put George in charge of operations. Bentham continued to devote time to botany and extending his herbarium while managing the estate. He studied plants with John Stuart Mills, a guest of his father. In 1823 he visited England to investigate agricultural methods and implements, while also acquainting himself with British botanists. By 1825 he had collected enough material to write his Catalogue des Plantes Indigènes des Pyrénees et du Bas Languedoc. Bentham's first botanical work firmly established him as a serious botanist.
In 1826 the Bentham family returned to England. In London, to ensure financial stability Bentham pursued law and entered Lincoln's Inn while assisting his Uncle Jeremy each morning. In 1927 he published his Outline of a New System of Logic, with a Critical Examination of Dr. Whaltey's 'Elements of Logic'. Bentham was disappointed with its response, and it was not until an 1850 article in the Athenaeum that Bentham's innovation was recognized. He continued to devote large amounts of time to botany, assisting other botanists and writing articles for botanical magazines. Bentham worked with Dr. Nathaniel Wallich in the distribution of his enormous Indian collection and his elaboration of the order Labitae, demonstrating his insight and great skill for taxonomic work. He became a member of Council of the both the Linnean and Horticulture Societies. He became Honorary Secretary of the Horticulture Society in 1829, a turbulent period for the organisation. With the aid of Assistant Secretary and friend John Lindley, Bentham returned the organisation to a financially and scientifically thriving state. He also instituted the first Chiswick Horticultural Fete in April, 1832.
In 1833 Bentham married Sarah Brydges, the daughter of a diplomat. At this time Bentham ended his career in law to pursue botany full time. Bentham further secured his place in the scientific world with the publication of his Labiatarum Genera et Species, 1832-36. In 1836 he toured the gardens and herbaria of Europe, settling in Vienna in the fall to prepare his first important work on Leguminosae, Leguminorarum Generibus Commentiones.
From 1842 to 1854 Bentham resided at Pontrilas House, Herefordshire where he diligently continued his botanical work. He added to his ever growing herbarium and elaborated on various orders of plants for De Candolle's Prodromus. By 1854 Bentham found the maintenance of his herbarium and library too demanding, and presented them to the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. He returned to London for the final time, and was encouraged by Sir WJ Hooker, the Garden's Director, to continue his botanical studies at Kew. Bentham was accommodated with his own work space in the Kew Herbarium, where he worked almost every day for the next thirty years.
Bentham produced numerous important botanical works during these years. His Flora Hongkongensis was published in 1861. Bentham completed the Flora Australiensis (1863-1870) in seven volumes, describing around 7,000 species. This was the first time the flora of any large continental area had been finished, and was a remarkable achievement for Bentham. His most major work, however, was done in conjunction with Sir Joseph Hooker. The Genera Plantarum, a revision of the known genera of Phanerogams, was started in 1862 and completed in 1883. Bentham also published the illustrated Handbook to British Flora, a beginner's guide to flora of the British Isles. Bentham took on many other projects during his years at Kew. After Dr. Wallich's return to India he catalogued and distributed the last portion of Wallich's massive herbarium. He also catalogued, arranged and distributed plants collected by Robert and Richard Schomburgk in Guiana, Theodor Hartweg's collections from Columbia, Mexico and California, and Richard Spruce's specimens from Brazil and Peru. He also classified and named the 30,000 species constituting the herbarium of his friend C. Leman. This huge undertaking took ten years and earned Bentham an honorary degree from the University of Cambridge, where the Leman Herbarium was deposited.
Bentham was awarded a Royal Medal in 1859, and elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1862. He served as President of the Linnean Society from 1861 to 1874. During his presidency he developed a scheme for classifying books in the library, and later used same system to help Kew Gardens arrange its new library. Bentham passed away on 10 September 1884, working almost right up to his death. He made Joseph Hooker one of the executors of his estate and left Hooker to administer his greatly extensive collection of correspondence, diaries, papers and manuscripts, which form the Bentham collection at the Kew Gardens Archive.
Jeremy Bentham was born in London in 1748. He was educated at Westminster School, and Queen's College, Oxford, before practising law. He became a leading enlightenment thinker and the originator of Utilitarianism. His body was preserved after his death and is displayed at University College London.
Born, 15 February 1748; learned Latin, Greek and French at a young age; attended Westminster School, 1755; Queen's College Oxford, 1760; awarded BA degree in 1763 and Master's in 1766; called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn, 1817; did not succeed or continue in the law profession; dabbled in chemistry and the physical sciences but the doctrine of utilitarianism and the principle of 'the greatest happiness of the greatest number', law reform, politics, jurisprudence and philosophy, became the occupation of his life; produced a utilitarian justification for democracy; also concerned with prison reform, religion, poor relief, international law, and animal welfare; published many writings on these subjects; died, 6 June 1832.
Publications: Introduction to the principles of morals and legislation (T Payne and Son, London, 1789)
Chrestomathia: being a collection of papers, explanatory of the design of an institution, proposed to be set on foot, under the name of the Chrestomathic Day School (Payne and Foss, London, 1815)
Supply without Burthen; or Escheat vice Taxation (J Debrett, London, 1795)
A Fragment on Government; being an examination of what is delivered on the subject of government in general, in the introduction to Sir W Blackstone's Commentaries (T Payne, London, 1776)
Constitutional Code; for the use of all nations, and all governments professing liberal opinions (printed for the Author, London, 1830)
Born, 15 February 1748; learned Latin, Greek and French at a young age; attended Westminster School, 1755; Queen's College Oxford, 1760; awarded BA degree in 1763 and Master's in 1766; called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn, 1817; did not succeed or continue in the law profession; dabbled in chemistry and the physical sciences but the doctrine of utilitarianism and the principle of 'the greatest happiness of the greatest number', law reform, politics, jurisprudence and philosophy, became the occupation of his life; produced a utilitarian justification for democracy; also concerned with prison reform, religion, poor relief, international law, and animal welfare; published many writings on these subjects; died, 6 June 1832. Publications: Introduction to the principles of morals and legislation (T Payne & Son, London, 1789); Chrestomathia: being a collection of papers, explanatory of the design of an institution, proposed to be set on foot, under the name of the Chrestomathic Day School (Payne & Foss, London, 1815); Supply without Burthen; or Escheat vice Taxation (J Debrett, London, 1795); A Fragment on Government; being an examination of what is delivered on the subject of government in general, in the introduction to Sir W Blackstone's Commentaries (T Payne, London, 1776); Constitutional Code; for the use of all nations, and all governments professing liberal opinions (printed for the Author, London, 1830); many other writings.
Brigadier-General Sir Samuel Bentham (1757-1831) was an engineer and naval architect and was an official in the Russian Navy (1780-1791) and in the British Navy (1795-1831). He was the brother of the reformer and philosopher Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832).
Ruth Mary Cavendish-Bentinck (1867-1953) was born Ruth St Maur in Tangiers in 1867. She was the illegitimate daughter of Viscount Ferdinand St Maur, the eldest son of the Duke of Somerset, and a half-gypsy kitchen maid. Her father died in 1869 and her mother went on to marry. Consequently the Duke and Duchess of Somerset raised the child themselves and Ruth was brought up in the English aristocracy. She was brought up within the family home and on her grandmother's death was left an endowment of £80,000. Despite this, by 1887, she was already a committed Fabian Socialist. She energetically supported the cause of socialism, and later that of women's suffrage, throughout her life. In 1887 she married Frederick Cavendish-Bentinck, the grandson of Lord Frederick Bentinck, who was himself a rich man until the death of his father, who left the couple was considerable inherited debts to pay off. She joined the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) in 1909 and the Fabian Women's Group the following year, when she also published The Point Of Honour: A Correspondence On Aristocracy And Socialism. She become part of the Fabian suffrage unit in 1912 and was able to use her social connections for political ends: for instance, she was able to persuade Bernard Shaw to intervene to have Gladys Evans released from prison in Dublin. That same year she was an organiser of the Women's March from Edinburgh to London and went on to become the secretary of the 'Qui Vive Corps'. However, like a number of members of the WSPU, she became alarmed at the rightward drift of the group and its increasingly violent tactics under the Pankhursts. Therefore, 1912 was also the year when she left the group for the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). She was one of the first members of the Election Fighting Fund Committee that promised support to any party officially supporting suffrage in an election where the candidate was challenging an anti-suffrage Liberal. This in effect meant the NUWSS supporting the Labour Party in elections. While this disturbed many NUWSS members, it was fully supported by Cavendish-Bentinck who, on behalf of the Fabian Women's Group, approached the other members of the 'Qui Vive Corps' to start a propaganda campaign amongst the miners of Staffordshire and Derbyshire around this time. In 1913 she took on more activities, becoming an organiser of the Northern Men's Federation for Women's Suffrage and the following year published an article in the 'Women's Dreadnought'. By 1917 she had become a member of the executive committee of the United Suffragists. The main work for which she is remembered is the creation in 1909 of a subscription library of feminist materials open for the use of any individuals working for women's suffrage. She remained actively involved when the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies took it over, along with the Edward Wright Library, in 1918 and it became one of the core collections of the Women's Service Library (now the Women's Library) when it was gifted to them in 1931. Ruth Cavendish-Bentinck died in 1953.
Ruth Mary Cavendish-Bentinck (1867-1953) was born Ruth St Maur in Tangiers in 1867. She was the illegitimate daughter of Viscount Ferdinand St Maur, the eldest son of the Duke of Somerset, and a half-gypsy kitchen maid. Her father died in 1869 and her mother went on to marry. Consequently the Duke and Duchess of Somerset raised the child themselves and Ruth was brought up in the English aristocracy. She was brought up within the family home and on her grandmother's death was left an endowment of £80,000. Despite this, by 1887, she was already a committed Fabian Socialist.She energetically supported the cause of socialism, and later that of women's suffrage, throughout her life. In 1887 she married Frederick Cavendish-Bentinck, the grandson of Lord Frederick Bentinck, who was himself a rich man until the death of his father, who left the couple was considerable inherited debts to pay off. She joined the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) in 1909 and the Fabian Women's Group the following year, when she also published 'The Point Of Honour: A Correspondence On Aristocracy And Socialism'. She become part of the Fabian suffrage unit in 1912 and was able to use her social connections for political ends: for instance, she was able to persuade Bernard Shaw to intervene to have Gladys Evans released from prison in Dublin. That same year she was an organiser of the Women's March from Edinburgh to London and went on to become the secretary of the 'Qui Vive Corps'. However, like a number of members of the WSPU, she became alarmed at the rightward drift of the group and its increasingly violent tactics under the Pankhursts. Therefore, 1912 was also the year when she left the group for the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). She was one of the first members of the Election Fighting Fund Committee that promised support to any party officially supporting suffrage in an election where the candidate was challenging an anti-suffrage Liberal. This in effect meant the NUWSS supporting the Labour Party in elections. While this disturbed many NUWSS members, it was fully supported by Cavendish-Bentinck who, on behalf of the Fabian Women's Group, approached the other members of the 'Qui Vive Corps' to start a propaganda campaign amongst the miners of Staffordshire and Derbyshire around this time. In 1913 she took on more activities, becoming an organiser of the Northern Men's Federation for Women's Suffrage and the following year published an article in the 'Women's Dreadnought'. By 1917 she had become a member of the executive committee of the United Suffragists. The main work for which she is remembered is the creation in 1909 of a subscription library of feminist materials open for the use of any individuals working for women's suffrage. She remained actively involved when the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies took it over, along with the Edward Wright Library, in 1918 and it became one of the core collections of the Women's Service Library (now the Women's Library) when it was gifted to them in 1931. Ruth Cavendish-Bentinck died in 1953.
Helen Caroline Bentwich née Franklin (1892-1972) was the daughter of Arthur Ellis Franklin (1857-1938), senior partner in the banking house of A Keyser and Co, leader of the New West End Synagogue, and brother-in-law of the Liberal cabinet minister, Herbert Samuel, and Caroline Franklin née Jacob. Helen's brother was the suffrage campaigner, Hugh Franklin (1889-1962); her niece was the scientist Rosalind Franklin (1920-1958). Helen trained in social work at Bedford College and ran a Girl Guide unit in the East End and a Jewish Girls' Club in Soho, London. During a visit to Egypt with her parents in 1910 she met her future husband, Norman de Mattos Bentwich (1883-1971). Norman, who had been educated at Cambridge and called to the bar in 1908, worked for the Egyptian Ministry of Justice until the outbreak of war in 1914 when he joined the British Army in Egypt and took part in the conquest of Jerusalem. The couple married in 1915. During the First World War Helen undertook a variety of work: in a hospital; at Woolwich Arsenal - from which she was dismissed for her trade union activity; and as an organiser of the Land Girls. In 1918 Norman became legal secretary to the British military administration in Palestine and, after the establishment of the Mandate in 1922, the country's first Attorney-General. Helen lived with him in Jerusalem until 1929 when his position, as an official and a Jew, became increasingly difficult; they returned to London, and Norman retired from the Colonial service in 1931. He became Professor of International Relations at the Hebrew University in 1932 and was active in many spheres, including serving as director of the League of Nations high commission for refugees from Germany (1933-1935). He also served in the Ministry of Information during World War II and was involved in the National Peace Council (1944-1946). In the inter-war and post-war years Helen was active in Labour politics and stood for Parliament, although she was never elected. However, she was prominent on the London County Council (LCC), of which she became chair in 1956. Helen died in 1972.
Francis Tyssen (d 1699) bought up manors in Hackney from 1697 onwards. He left his estates to his son Francis (d 1710) who in turn left them to his son Francis (d 1717). The latter Francis married Rachel, daughter of neighbouring landowner Richard de Beauvoir. His estates were left to his posthumous son Francis John Tyssen, who left the estates were left to his daughter Mary Tyssen. Her grandson William George Daniel (1801-55) took the surname Daniel-Tyssen. He married Amelia Amhurst. Their son William Amhurst Tyssen (1835-1909) adopted the surname Tyssen-Amherst in 1852, changing it to Tyssen-Amherst in 1877. His estates included 9488 acres at Didlington Hall, Norfolk, as well as the Hackney estates in London.
Richard de Beauvoir purchased the Manor of Hoxton or Balmes in 1687. He died in 1708 leaving the land to his son Osmond, who in turn left the manor to his son Reverend Peter de Beauvoir, who was the last sinecure rector of Hackney. He died in 1821, and the estate passed to Richard Benyon of Englefield House, Berkshire, the grandson of Francis John Tyssen's sister Mary Benyon, and the great-grandson of Richard de Beauvoir's daughter Rachel and her husband Francis Tyssen. Richard adopted the surname Benyon de Beauvoir. While in his ownership the estate was developed by William Rhodes into the area still known as De Beauvoir Town.
Information from 'Hackney: Manors', A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 10: Hackney (1995), pp. 75-91.
Josef Beran (1888-1969) was Archbishop of Prague and was later made a Cardinal. Beran was put under house arrest by the new Communist government in 1949. He was released in 1963 and in 1965 was allowed to leave Czechoslovakia for the Vatican City.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
Born 1913; Lt, Royal Scots Greys, 1939; service in Middle East and Italy, World War Two; in charge of Directorate for re-education and repatriation of German POWs, under Foreign Office Political Intelligence Department, 1946; Capt, A Sqn, Royal Scots Greys, Germany, 1948; service with Army, Navy and Air Force Intelligence Centre, Nuneham Courtenay, Oxfordshire, 1950-1952; Military Attache, British Embassy, Rangoon, Burma, 1954-1957; retired from Army, 1960; service in Joint Intelligence Bureau, Ministry of Defence, 1964-1971; Director of Overseas Defence Relations, Ministry of Defence, 1971-1980; retired, 1980.
Person
Dr. George F.J. Bergmann was a German Jew who enrolled in the French Foreign Legion as a foreign national living in France in 1939. He was later interned in the notorious prison, Hadjerat M'Guil, in French North Africa and later fought for the British in a pioneer corps company. His origins are not known. He emigrated to Australia after the war. Evidently he was a keen mountaineer.
Dr. George Bergmann was born the son of a salesman in Lissa (Posen) in 1900. He went to school in Lissa and then studied philosophy, economics and law in the universities of Heidelberg, Breslau and Munich. During this period he became a member of the Kartellverband jüdischer Studenten to which organisation he retained links for the rest of his life.
Gained his doctorate, oeconomiae publicae, at the Univeristy of Munich, 1922; became a lawyer, 1929; began working in the chambers of the lawyers Julius Heilbronner and Dr. Eugen Schmidt, 1930.
In June 1933 he went to France where in September he was struck off the register of lawyers as a consequence of the Nazi racial laws. Unable to obtain a work permit he supported himself through casual work. In 1935 he married F I Hilde Baum from Fulda.
At the outbreak of war he volunteered to serve in the French army. There followed periods of internment in a number of prison camps, service in the Foreign Legion and served in the British Army in North Africa, Italy and Austria, 1943-1947.
In January 1947 he was demobilised to Australia where he owned a delicatessen business, was one time secretary of the World Jewish Congress and having gained British and Australian nationality in 1950, became a permanent officer of the Commonwealth.
The Bergmann family were residents of Leipzig and travelled to Great Britain probably some time in 1939. Walter Manfred Bergmann was a practising doctor until the beginning of October 1938, after which time he was no longer allowed to practise on account of his Jewish decent.
H. Berhard was a bookseller of Rouen.
The Berkeley family's seat was at Berkeley Castle, Gloucestershire built in 1153 by Lord Maurice Berkeley. Lord Berkeley of Stratton (died 1678) ran the Duke of York's household and built himself a magnificent London house in Piccadilly. His descendants laid out Berkeley Square in the grounds. In 1679 George Berkeley made first Earl of Berkeley by King Charles II.
The fifth Earl of Berkeley, Frederick Augustus (1745-1810) took Mary Cole, a butcher's daughter as his mistress. In 1796 they married, Mary having borne the earl five children and later that year their legitimate son Thomas Moreton was born. Mary was anxious about the legitimacy of her adored eldest son William Fitzharding (1786-1857). In 1799 she and the Earl forged the Berkeley parish register with a false entry for a secret marriage 1785 to make all their children legitimate. On the death of the earl in 1810, the Berkeley Peerage Case was heard in the House of Lords and in 1811 the earldom passed to Thomas Moreton. In 1841 William Fitzharding was given the title Earl Fitzhardinge.
The family held estates throughout England.
The Berkeley family's seat was at Berkeley Castle, Gloucestershire built in 1153 by Lord Maurice Berkeley. Lord Berkeley of Stratton (died 1678) ran the Duke of York's household and built himself a magnificent London house in Piccadilly. His descendants laid out Berkeley Square in the grounds. In 1679 George Berkeley was made first Earl of Berkeley by King Charles II.
The fifth Earl of Berkeley, Frederick Augustus (1745-1810) took Mary Cole, a butcher's daughter as his mistress. In 1796 they married, Mary having borne the earl five children and later that year their legitimate son Thomas Moreton was born. Mary was anxious about the legitimacy of her adored eldest son William Fitzharding (1786-1857). In 1799 she and the earl forged the Berkeley parish register with a false entry for a secret marriage 1785 to make all their children legitimate. On the death of the earl in 1810, the Berkeley Peerage Case was heard in the House of Lords and in 1811 the earldom passed to Thomas Moreton. In 1841 William Fitzharding was given the title Earl Fitzhardinge.
The family held estates throughout England.
The Berkeley family's seat was at Berkeley Castle, Gloucestershire built in 1153 by Lord Maurice Berkeley. Lord Berkeley of Stratton (died 1678) ran the Duke of York's household and built himself a magnificent London house in Piccadilly. His descendants laid out Berkeley Square in the grounds. In 1679 George Berkeley made first Earl of Berkeley by King Charles II.
The fifth Earl of Berkeley, Frederick Augustus (1745-1810) took Mary Cole, a butcher's daughter as his mistress. In 1796 they married, Mary having borne the earl five children and later that year their legitimate son Thomas Moreton was born. Mary was anxious about the legitimacy of her adored eldest son William Fitzharding (1786-1857). In 1799 she and earl forged the Berkeley parish register with a false entry for a secret marriage 1785 to make all their children legitimate. On the death of the earl in 1810, the Berkeley Peerage Case was heard in the House of Lords and in 1811 the earldom passed to Thomas Moreton. In 1841 William Fitzharding was given the title Earl Fitzhardinge.
The family held estates throughout England, including the Manor of Cranford, the Manor of Harlington and the Manor of Harlington with Shepiston. For a detailed history of the three manors please see: A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 3: Shepperton, Staines, Stanwell, Sunbury, Teddington, Heston and Isleworth, Twickenham, Cowley, Cranford, West Drayton, Greenford, Hanwell, Harefield and Harlington (1962).
Poor relief was based on the Act for the Relief of the Poor of 1601 which obliged parishes to take care of the aged and needy in their area. Parish overseers were empowered to collect a local income tax known as the poor-rate which would be put towards the relief of the poor. This evolved into the rating system, where the amount of poor-rate charged was based on the value of a person's property. Early workhouses were constructed and managed by the parish. However, this process was expensive and various schemes were devised where groups of parishes could act together and pool their resources. As early as 1647 towns were setting up 'Corporations' of parishes. An Act of 1782, promoted by Thomas Gilbert, allowed adjacent parishes to combine into Unions and provide workhouses. These were known as 'Gilbert's Unions' and were managed by a board of Guardians.
Under the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834, the Poor Law Commission was given the power to unite parishes in England and Wales into Poor Law Unions. Each Union was to be administered by a local Board of Guardians. Relief was to be provided through the provision of a workhouse. An amendment to the 1834 Act allowed already existing 'Gilbert's Unions' or Corporations of parishes to remain in existence, although they were encouraged to convert themselves into Poor Law Unions. Although there was some reorganisation of union boundaries, particularly in London, the majority of Unions created under the 1834 Act remained in operation until 1930. In March 1930 a new Local Government Bill abolished the Poor Law Unions and the Board of Guardians. Responsibility for their institutions passed to Public Assistance Committees managed by the county councils - in the metropolis either the London County Council or the Middlesex County Council.
The Saint Olave's Poor Law Union was founded in 1836, consisting of the parishes of Saint Olave's, Saint Thomas and Saint John Horsleydown, in the Southwark - Bermondsey area. In 1836 a separate Board of Guardians for the parish of Saint Mary Magdalen was constituted. In 1869 the Saint Mary Magdalen parish joined the Saint Olave's Union, along with the parish of Saint Mary Rotherhithe. In 1904 the Union was renamed Bermondsey Poor Law Union.
Saint Olave's Workhouse on Parish Street was well established as early as 1729, run by the parish of Saint John Horsleydown. The Union was also responsible for the Bermondsey Workhouse on Tanner Street and the Rotherhithe Workhouse on Lower Road. In 1873 to 1875, a new infirmary was constructed at the west side of Lower Road, opposite the workhouse. An infirmary for the aged was constructed at Ladywell in 1897. The Union provided several institutions for children, including the Shirley Schools cottage homes in Croydon.
Source of information: Peter Higginbotham at The Workhouse website.
Born Tasmania; studied physics and astronomy at Melbourne University; took part in the Southern Cross expedition, 1898; came to England, 1900; Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, 1900-1942; physicist on the National Antarctic expedition, 1901-1904; Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve (anti-submarine division) 1914-1919; Member of RGS Council 1929-31; RGS Medal.
Born in 1907; educated at Stonyhurst College, Bedford School and Emmanuel College, Cambridge; research at Davy Faraday Laboratory, 1923-1927; lecturer and later Assistant Director of Research in Crystallography at Cambridge University, 1934-1937; Professor of Physics, 1937-1963; Professor of Crystallography, Birkbeck College, University of London, 1963-1968; Emeritus Professor, 1968-1971; died in 1971. Publications: The world, the flesh, and the devil (Kegan Paul and Co, London, 1929); The social function of science (G Routledge and Sons, London, 1939); The freedom of necessity (Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1949); The physical basis of life (Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1951); Marx and science (Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1952); Science and industry in the nineteenth century (Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1953); Science in history (Watts and Co, London, 1954); World Without War (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1958); A prospect of peace (Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1960); The extension of man: a history of physics before 1900 (Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1972).
John Desmond Bernal, 1901-1971, was born in Nenagh, Ireland and educated at Bedford School and Emmanuel College, Cambridge. He embarked on a career in crystallography, becoming a lecturer and later Assistant Director of Research in Crystallography at Cambridge, 1934-1937, Professor of Physics at Birkbeck College, 1937-1963, and Professor of Crystallography at Birkbeck 1963-1968. He was made Honorary Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge in 1965, and Fellow of Birkbeck College in 1969. He was also interested in the role that science could play in society and published books and pamphlets on this subject. He was a founder member of the World Peace Council, holding the presidency 1958-1965, and was awarded the Lenin Prize for Peace in 1958.
Frederick Bernal, 1828-1903, was HM Consul in Madrid (1854-1858), Cartagena (1858-1861), Baltimore (1861-1866), and Le Havre (1866-1896).
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.
No biographical information has been discovered for the Berney family.
Bernard Basil Bernstein (1924-2000) was educated at Christ's College, Finchley, London. After serving in the RAF during World War Two, he went on to study sociology at the London School of Economics, graduating in 1951. Meanwhile he also undertook social work, being a resident Settlement Worker at the Bernard Baron Settlement in Stepney, London, from 1947-1949, where he undertook family case work, youth club work, community organisation and participated in 'delinquent camps'. He went on to train as a teacher at Westminster Training College (1953-1954) and then taught a range of subjects at the City Day College, Golden Lane (1954-1960), becoming a Research Assistant at University College London (1960-1963) and obtaining a PhD from the University of London in 1963. From 1962 to 1967 Bernstein was a Reader in the Sociology of Education at the University of London Institute of Education, being Head of the Sociological Research Unit from 1962 and Professor in the Sociology of Education from 1967. From 1979 he was the Karl Mannheim Professor in the Sociology of Education at the Institute and from 1984 was Senior Pro-Director and Pro-Director Research. After his retirement in 1991 Bernsetin became an Emeritus Professor. He held honorary degrees from several different universities. Bernstein was influential in the field of socio-linguistics. His published works, in particular the five volumes of the series on Class, Codes and Control, have become classics in the field.
Born 1872; educated Dulwich High School, Kent, and Bedford and Royal Holloway Colleges, London, gaining a BSc in Physics, 1898; elected one of first female members of Linnean Society, 1905, and was one of the first women to read a paper before the Society, Nov 1905; scientific papers published in The Annals of Botany and The New Phytologist, 1905-1914; Research Student at University College, 1906, and Imperial College, 1910, University of London; founded research laboratory at Bedford College, University of London, 1909; work on the agglutination of dysentery bacteria and preparation of serum, University of Liverpool, 1914-1919; work on the separation and identification of plant pathogenic bacteria, Imperial College, University of London, 1919-1920; set up Botanical Research Fund for postgraduate students and gave equipment to Royal Holloway Botanical Department; died 1947.
The seat of Richard Berridge was Ballynahinch Castle, County Galway, Ireland, which became the residence of his son, Richard, who was a justice of the peace for the county and, in 1894, High Sheriff.
Richard Berridge the elder lived for over twenty years in Bloomsbury, first at 36 Bloomsbury Square, then, from about 1856 to 1877, at 18 Great Russell Street. Prior to this he had resided in Rochester, Kent, and he acquired property in that county as well as in Middlesex. A return of landowners in 1873 describes his holdings in Middlesex as over 300 acres with a gross estimated rental of £577, and a smaller amount in Kent, 79 acres worth £184.15s. He also had mining interests and property in other counties. Berridge entered into partnership with Sir Henry Meux of the Horse Shoe Brewery, Tottenham Court Road. He retired in July 1878 on the establishment of the new firm of Meux and Company. In the late 1870's Berridge left Bloomsbury for an address in Putney, Surrey, and, after a few years, went to live in Bridgewater, Somerset. He died on 20 September 1887 leaving five daughters and one son, Richard, born in 1870.
The estate was administered by trustees until Richard Berridge the younger came of age. In his will, Berridge bequeathed a charity legacy of £200,000 to be applied for the advancement and propagation of education in economic and sanitary sciences in Great Britain. The legacy was administered by his trustees, who donated large sums to the Worshipful Company of Plumbers and the British Institute of Preventive Medicine, and smaller amounts to other institutions and societies, such as the Sanitary Inspectors' Association and Queen Victoria's Jubilee Institute for Nurses.
In 1927 C E Berry was appointed to the staff of the Wellcome Bureau of Scientific Research, which formed part of the Wellcome Laboratory of Tropical Medicine in 1946. He was Chief Technician until his retirement in 1958. The notebooks are undated, but probably date from Berry's early years at the WBSR, 1920s-1930s, and include loose notes inserted between the pages.
Dennis Berry was an architect and scholar who was head of the department of Architecture at Kingston School of Art/ Kingston Polytechnic from 1966-1987. During this period the Architecture course grew in reputation.
Kingston School of Art (later Kingston College of Art) was originally part of Kingston Technical Institute, but formed as a separate institution in 1930. The College moved into its own campus in the Knight's Park area of Kingston in 1939. The School continued to grow in the subsequent years, teaching a number of design related subjects including Fashion and architecture. In 1970 the Kingston College of Art merged with Kingston College of Technology to form Kingston Polytechnic. The former College's site is now the University's Knights Park Campus.