No information available at the time of compilation.
James Jardine was born in Applegarth, Dumfriesshire, and educated in Dumfries and Edinburgh. By 1809 he was practising as a civil engineer in Edinburgh and subsequently became well known for his work both in that city and elsewhere. He was a member of Royal Society of Edinburgh, the Geological Society, the Institution of Civil Engineers and the Society of Civil Engineers, and served as a Director of the Edinburgh Astronomical Institution.
Charles Cockerell was born at Bishops Hull, Somerset in 1755. He was educated at Winchester College. Between 1776 and 1801 he worked for the East India Company in Bengal, spending several years as postmaster general in Calcutta. On his return to Britain, Cockerell became a successful businessman in London, with a house at Hyde Park Corner and a country estate at Sezincote, Gloucestershire. He maintained a lifelong interest in India. He served as an MP between 1802 and his death in 1837. He was made a baronet in 1809.
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.
George Combe was born and educated in Edinburgh before practising as a lawyer. He first encountered phrenology in 1815 and, though initially sceptical, he and his brother Andrew soon became two of its leading exponents, co-founding the Edinburgh Phrenological Society in 1820. George Combe lectured extensively on phrenology and its relationships with religion, science, education and social systems, and wrote several books, including The Constitution of Man (1828). The actress Sarah Siddons was his mother-in-law.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
John Taylor was born in Norwich in 1779. The son of the yarn manufacturer and nonconformist minister John Taylor (1750-1826) and his wife Susanna née Cook (1755-1823). He trained as a land surveyor and civil engineer and became successful in the field of metal mining and a leading exponent of new mining technology. Taylor was also deeply interested in mining development overseas and in scientific education. He was a fellow of the Royal Society, a prominent member of the Geological Society of London and the Institution of Civil Engineers, and helped to found both the University of London and the British Association for the Advancement of Science. Several of his siblings were also prominent in engineering, printing and the arts.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
George Parker Bidder was born in Moretonhampstead, Devon. As a child, he was discovered to have an outstanding memory and a gift for mental arithmetic, which led to his being 'exhibited' throughout Britain; eventually, he was sponsored to study at the University of Edinburgh. After leaving Edinburgh in 1824, Bidder became a succesful civil engineer, working particularly on railways and telegraphs, and was an active member of the Institution of Civil Engineers and the British Association of the Advancement of Science. His eldest son and grandson, both also named George Parker Bidder, were successful in the fields of law and marine biology respectively.
No information was available at the time of cataloguing.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
James Cosmo Melvill was born in Guernsey and brought up there and in England. He entered the East India Company's home service as young man and rose through the company's financial arm to become Chief Secretary in 1836. He was knighted in 1853 and retired in 1858, after 50 years of service.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
Walter Francis Montagu-Douglas-Scott was born in Dalkeith, Midlothian, Scotland in 1806. He was educated at Eton and at St John's College, Cambridge. He succeeded to the dukedom aged 13, on his father's death. Buccleuch became a member of the Privy Council in 1842 and served as its president in 1846. He was also president of the Society of Antiquaries, during 1862-1873, and of the British Association in 1867. He was a strong supporter of the Conservative party and, as a leading estate-owner, exerted a strong influence over his tenants' political activities.
Charles Tilston Bright was born at Wansted, Essex in 1832. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' School before joining the Electric Telegraph Company and later the Magnetic Telegraph Company. His best known achievement, the laying of the first telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean (1858) earned him a knighthood at the age of 26. From 1860 onwards Bright worked as an independent consultant. He was also independent Liberal MP for Greenwich between 1865 and 1868.
Thomas Bazley was born and educated in Bolton, Lancashire. He became successful in the textile industry in Manchester and was heavily involved in local politics. He became an MP in 1857 and a baronet in 1869. Bazley was also deeply interested in education, supporting the Manchester School system and becoming one the founding governors and a trustee of the Victoria University of Manchster. From the 17870s he lived mainly in Gloucestershire, at his country estate at Eyford Park.
Eyre Massey Shaw was born in County Cork, Ireland, and educated locally and at Trinity College Dublin. He spent several years in the navy before becoming superintendent of the police and fire services in Belfast in 1860; his success in this role led to his appointment a year later as the head of the London Fire Engine Establishment, later to become the Metropolitan Fire Brigade. Shaw was uncomfortable working under the new London County Council (constituted in 1889) and resigned from the job in 1891; he received a knighthood on his retirement.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
Cyrus West Field was born in Stockbridge, Massachussetts. His successful business ventures in New York City as a young man enabled him to retire aged 33. With Charles Tilston Bright and others, he formed the Atlantic Telegraph Company, which laid the first telegraph cable between Europe and North America in 1858. In later life, Field lost his money due to bad investments and was bankrupt at the time of his death.
John Coode was born in Bodmin, Cornwall in 1816. He was educated locally before being articled to a civil engineer. By the 1840s he had his own successful engineering practice in London and from the 1850s onwards regularly travelled abroad as the designer of or a consultant to large-scale port and harbour works in the British colonies. He was knighted in 1872 for his work on Portland Harbour, Dorset. Coode was also a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers, the Royal Colonial Institute, the Royal Commission on Metropolitan Sewage Discharge, and the International Commission of the Suez Canal.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
Josiah Latimer Clark was born in Great Marlow, Buckinghamshire in 1822. He trained as a manufacturing chemist but became a railway surveyor and engineer in 1847 and later worked for the Electric and International Telegraph Company, initially as an assistant to his elder brother Edwin Clark (1814-1894). In the 1860s, Latimer Clark (as he was generally known) worked in partnership with Charles Tilston Bright and others in the laying of long-distance telegraph cables. He maintained a strong interest in pneumatics, hydraulics and other forms of engineering. As well as a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers and co-founder of the Society of Telegraph Engineers and Electricians (afterwards the Institution of Electrical Engineers), Clark was a fellow of the Royal Society, the Royal Astronomical Society and the Royal Geographical Society.
William Henry Grenfell was born in London in 1855. He was educated at Harrow School and Balliol College, Oxford. He represented the university at several sports, including two appearances in the university boat race, and continued to participate in rowing, fencing, mountaineering, hunting and other sports for many years, including appearances at national level. In later life he was president of several sporting organizations, including the Amateur Athletic Association. Grenfell also served at various times as MP for Salisbury, for Hereford and for Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, before being created Baron Desborough in 1905. He also held a variety of public offices. His wife, Ethel, was a renowned society hostess. Lord Desborough's three sons (including the war poet Julian Grenfell) all having predeceased him, the barony became extinct on his death.
William Hesketh Lever was born and educated in Bolton, Lancashire. He started working in the family grocery business as a young man and his talent for marketing increased the success of the firm dramatically. The Sunlight and Lux brands are soap are among the products associated with him, as well as the Port Sunlight complex of factories and workers' accommodation that he built in Cheshire. Some of his other ventures, including attepts to develop the fishing industry in the Outer Hebrides and the palm oil industry in the Belgian Congo, were less successful. Lever served briefly as Liberal MP for the Wirral, Cheshire, between 1906 and 1909. He was created a baronet in 1911 and became Baron Leverhulme in 1917; the peerage was raised to a viscountcy in 1922.
Edward Alfred Goulding was born in Cork, Ireland, and educated at St John's College, Cambridge. He trained as a lawyer, but preferred politics, serving on London County Council (1895-1901) and as Conservative MP for Devizes (1895-1906) and Worcester (1908-1922). He was made a baronet in 1915, a privy counsellor in 1918, and Baron Wargrave in 1922. Lord Wargrave was also a successful financier and a close associate of Lord Beaverbrook.
George Balfour was born in Portsmouth. He qualified as an electrical engineer and came to specialize in electric tramways and power plants. With the accountant Andrew Beatty, he founded the construction firm Balfour Beatty in 1909, and helped to pioneer the National Grid in the 1930s. Balfour also served as Unionist MP for Hampstead from 1918 until his death in 1941.
Thomas Cooper was born in Leicester in 1805. He educated himself in languages, literature history and theology. He became a schoolteacher, preacher and journalist, and espoused radical Chartism whilst living and working in Leicester in the early 1840s. After serving 2 years in prison following Chartist riots in Staffordshire, he supported himself by writing prose and poetry. From 1856 onwards he was a travelling religious lecturer. He died in 1892.
John Proby was born in Stamford, Lincolnshire, in 1720. He was educated at Westminster School and Jesus College, Cambridge. He was elected MP for Stamford in 1747 and later served as MP for Huntingdonshire (1754-1768). Proby also held several public offices, including a position as a lord of the Admiralty (1763-1765). Alongside his English political career, he was made Baron Carysfort in the Irish peerage in 1754 and was a member of the Irish privy council. Rumours of mistresses and debts overshadowed Lord Carysfort's later years and he died in France aged 51.
Henry Hobhouse was born near Castle Cary, Somerset, and educated at Eton and at Brasenose College, Oxford. He subsequently studied law and was called to the bar in 1801. Hobhouse became a civil servant, working sucessively as Solicitor to HM Customs, Treasury Solicitor and Permanent Under-Secretary to the Home Department, from which he retired in 1827. In 1826 he had become Keeper of the State Papers, where his main task was superintending the publication of The State Papers of Henry VIII (11 volumes, 1830-1852). The State Papers Office was absorbed by the Public Record Office in 1854, the year of both Hobhouse's death and of the birth of his grandson and namesake, the politician Henry Hobhouse.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
Prince Alexander of Teck was born in 1874. The third son of Francis, Duke of Teck, and Princess Mary, Duchess of Teck (a granddaughter of George III and first cousin of Queen Victoria). Alexander's elder sister, Mary, was later Queen consort to George V. Prince Alexander was educated at Eton College and Sandhurst, before serving in the army in India and South Africa. He married Princess Alice of Albany (Queen Victoria's granddaughter) in 1904. The British Royal Family decided to discard German-sounding names during the First World War, so in July 1917, the Tecks adopted the surname Cambridge; Prince Alexander was created Earl of Athlone shortly afterwards. Athlone served as Governor-General of South Africa between 1923 and 1931 and of Canada between 1940 and 1946. He was also Chancellor of the University of London from 1932 until 1955. Both his sons predeceased him and the peerage became extinct when he died.
Details of the creator were unknown at the time of the compilation of this finding aid.
Joseph Cowen was the son of Sir Joseph Cowen (1800-1873) and his wife Mary. He succeeded his father as Liberal MP for Newcastle upon Tyne in 1873, holding the seat until 1886. He was a lifelong contributor to the Newcastle Chronicle, eventually becoming its owner and editor.
Stephen Spender was born in London, brought up in London and Norfolk, and educated at University College School in Hampstead and University College, Oxford. His first book of poetry was published in 1930 and was followed by many other works of poetry and prose, including World within World (1951), a novel heavily influenced by his earlier life and complicated sexuality. He co-edited the literary magazine Encounter 1953 until 1967, when he resigned over a funding scandal. In his later years, Spender was acclaimed as one of the leading poets writing in English and held several academic positions, including a chair at University College London (1970-1975). He received a CBE in 1962 and was knighted in 1983.
Frederic George Kenyon was born in London, brought up in Shropshire, and educated at Winchester College and at New College, Oxford. He began work in the manuscripts department at the British Museum in 1889 and became known as an expert on both Greek papyri and biblical texts. He was appointed director of the museum in 1909, retaining the position until he retired in 1930. Kenyon was a Fellow of the British Academy and of the Society of Antiquaries, served terms as President of the Classical Association and the Hellenic Society, and received numerous academic honours. He was knighted in 1912.
John Henry Pyle Pafford was Goldsmiths' Librarian of the University of London Library from 1945 to 1967. He published works on librarianship, including Library Cooperation in Europe (1935) and American and Canadian Libraries: some notes on a visit in the summer of 1947 (1949), and acted as an editor of The Year's Work in Librarianship during 1939-1950. He was also an editor of literary texts, notably the Arden edition of Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale.
Walter Wilson Greg was born in Wimbledon, Surrey, and educated at Harrow School and at Trinity College, Cambridge. He joined the Bibliographical Society in 1898 and subsequently complied several bibliographies and critical works relating to English drama and theatre, mainly from the Elizabethan and earlier periods. He was also librarian of Trinity College between 1907 and 1913. Greg was a major shareholder of and occasional contributor to The Economist magazine, founded by his maternal grandfather. He was knighted in 1950 for services to the study of literature.
Dorothy Shakespear was the daughter of the novelist Olivia Shakespear. She married the poet Ezra Pound in 1914.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
The Hon Victoria Mary Sackville-West (known throughout her life as Vita) was born at Knole, Kent, and educated at home and in London. She wrote both prose and poetry extensively from an early age. Sackville-West kept her own surname on her marriage to Harold George Nicholson (later Sir Harold) in 1913; the marriage was successful and lasted until her death, in spite of her many female lovers (including Violet Trefusis and Virginia Woolf). She continued to write throughout her life, alongside her long-running project to restore the gardens at Sissinghurst Castle.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
Francis Galton was born in Birmingham and educated locally, at King's College medical school in London and at Trinity College Cambridge. He settled in London and was active in both the Royal Society and the Royal Geographical Society. Galton spent many years examining the nature of human heredity and his work on inheritance patterns led to important advanced in the statistical analysis of biological phenomena and the development of psychometric tests; his ideas on eugenics largely fell out of favour during the mid-20th century, however. He was knighted in 1909 and received the Royal Society's Copley Medal in 1910.