OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/William of Littlington

William Ludlington in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
​WILLIAM of Littlington (d. 1312), theological writer, was, according to Leland, a native of Lindsey; according to Bale, of Littlington in Cambridgeshire. He became a Carmelite of Stamford, and took the degree of doctor of theology at Oxford. On the death of Henry de Hanna, in 1300, he succeeded him as provincial of the order; and in 1303 when Gerard of Bologna arranged the division of England into two provinces at the council of Narbonne in 1303, he opposed it. He was excommunicated, and subjected to a four years' penance, which he spent in teaching at Paris. In 1309 he was made provincial of the Holy Land and Cyprus at the council of Genoa. He died and was buried at Stamford in 1312. He wrote a ‘Commentary on St. Matthew,’ which seems at one time to have been extant at New College, Oxford (Tanner; but cf. Coxe, Cat. MSS. in Coll. Aulisque Oxon.) Bale and Pits mention other commentaries and theological works by him which are not known to be extant.
M. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/William of Ramsey

​WILLIAM of Ramsey (fl. 1219), hagiographer and poet, was a native of Ramsey and a monk of Crowland. His earliest work appears to have been a poem in 1666 hexameters (Univ. Libr. Cambridge MS. Dd. xi. 78), which was written probably at the time of the translation of the relics of St. Guthlac in 1195, and was dedicated to Henry of Longchamp, abbot of Crowland (1190–1236); some extracts from it have been printed by Birch in ‘Memorials of St. Guthlac,’ and by Searle in ‘Ingulf and the Historia Croylandensis,’ p. 35. It is based principally on Felix's life. The statement in the ‘Annales Burgo-Spaldingenses,’ 1237, that one Henry wrote this life, is no doubt due to the fact that the manuscript contains works by Henry of Avranches. In the same manuscript are verse lives of the royal saints Fremund and Edmund, and also of St. Birinus, which Leland ascribes to him. The life of Birinus is dedicated to Peter des Roches [q. v.], bishop of Winchester 1205–38. Baronius is also of opinion that William wrote the prose life of St. Edmund printed by Surius (Vitæ Sanctorum, iv. 121). William also wrote: 1. A prose ‘Translatio S. Neoti’ found in several manuscripts, and printed in Whitaker and in the ‘Acta SS.’ July, vii. 330; it was written by him probably in 1213, when the abbot Henry translated his relics. A verse life printed by Whitaker is also from his pen. 2. A prose life of Waltheof, probably when Abbot Henry translated his relics in 1219. It has been printed by F. Michel in ‘Chroniques Anglo-Normandes,’ from the Douai MS. 851, where it is found in a disordered arrangement. This Douai manuscript, all of which deals with Waltheof's life or death, has been analysed by Dr. Liebermann (Ostenglische Geschichtsquellen), who positively ascribes to William two of the pieces in it, and thinks the rest may also be by him, except the ‘Miracula Waldevi.’ A work, ‘De Vita et Moribus Philosophorum,’ addressed by one William to a friend named Guthlac, was seen by Leland in the library of St. Paul's (Collect. iii. 47, and Dugdale's St. Paul's, p. 283), and has also been ascribed to William of Ramsey. Dr. Stubbs, however, inclines to think that it is by William of Malmesbury, and that it is identical with Harleian MS. 3969, of which the first leaves are now gone (Gesta Regum, I. cxlii).
In Leland's opinion the works on Bæda and Isidore ascribed to William of Ramsey were probably the work of Brihtferth of Ramsey (Collect. iii. 23). The ‘Translatio Sarisburiensis,’ found in conjunction with William's works in the destroyed Cottonian MS. Vit. D xiv, and in the Cambridge MS. Dd. xi. 78, is ascribed by Matthew Paris (Chron. Maj. iii. 189) to Henry of Avranches.
William of Crowland (d. 1179), abbot of Ramsey and Cluny, has been confounded with the above. He was prior of St. Martin des Prés, became abbot of Ramsey by the interest of Becket (1161), and in 1177 was made abbot of Cluny (Bibl. Cluniac. p. 1662). He died at Charité on 7 Jan. 1179 (Chron. Ramesiensis).
M. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/William of Ware

​WILLIAM of Ware, or WILLIAM WARRE, Guaro, or Varron (fl. 1300?), philosopher, born at Ware in Hertfordshire, entered the Franciscan order in his youth. He was S.T.P. of Paris, and spent most of his life there. According to one historian of the Franciscans, he was a pupil of Alexander of Hales [q. v.] Several authorities concur in calling him the master of Duns Scotus [see Duns, Joannes Scotus], who went to Paris in 1304, and he is twice mentioned in the works of Scotus. No early authority is forthcoming for the statement that he studied at Oxford and was professor of divinity there in 1301. By later writers he was called ‘doctor fundatus.’ He wrote commentaries on the sentences of which many manuscripts are extant, e.g. at Oxford Merton Coll. MSS. 103, 104, at Toulouse, Troyes, Vienna, Florence, and Padua (see Little, Grey Friars at Oxford, p. 213). Tanner names other philosophical and theological works of which no manuscripts are known.
M. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/White, James (1803-1862)

​WHITE, JAMES (1803–1862), author, born in Midlothian in March 1803, was the younger son of John White of Dunmore in the county of Stirling, by his wife Elizabeth, daughter of John Logan of Howden in Midlothian. After studying at Glasgow University he matriculated from Pembroke College, Oxford, on 15 Dec. 1823, graduating B.A. in 1827. He served as curate of Hartest-cum-Boxsted in Suffolk, and on 27 March 1833 he was instituted vicar of Loxley in Warwickshire. Ultimately, on succeeding to a considerable patrimony on the death of his wife's father, he resigned his living and retired to Bonchurch in the Isle of Wight. In this retreat he turned his attention to literature, in which he had already made some essays, producing between 1845 and 1847 a succession of Scottish historical tragedies, works of some merit, though only moderately successful. Another tragedy, ‘John Savile of Haystead’ (London, 1847, 8vo), was acted at Sadler's Wells Theatre in 1847. At a later time he brought out several historical sketches of a popular character, written with considerable power of generalisation. The best known is ‘The Eighteen Christian Centuries’ (Edinburgh, 1858, 8vo), which reached a fourth edition in 1864.
White died at Bonchurch on 26 March 1862. He married in 1839 Rosa, only daughter of Colonel Popham Hill. By her he had one son, James (1841–1888), and three daughters. White possessed a charming style, and interested his readers by his clearness of thought and his ability in selecting and arranging detail. He was the friend of Charles Dickens, who in 1849 took a house at Bonchurch for some months in order to be near him. One of his tragedies was dedicated to Dickens. His portrait was painted in 1850 by Robert Scott Lauder.
Besides the works already mentioned, White was the author of:
* ‘The Village Poorhouse; by a Country Curate,’ London, 1832, 12mo.
* ‘Church and School: a Dialogue in Verse,’ London, 1839, 12mo.
* ‘The Adventures of Sir Frizzle Pumpkin,’ London, 1836, 8vo.
* ‘The Earl of Gowrie: a Tragedy,’ London, 1845, 8vo.
* ‘The King and the Commons: a Drama,’ London, 1846, 8vo.
* ‘Feudal Times; or the Court of James III: a Scottish historical Play,’ London, 1847, 16mo.
* ‘Landmarks of the History of England,’ London, 1855, 8vo.
* ‘Landmarks of the History of Greece,’ London, 1857, 8vo.
* ‘Robert Burns and Walter Scott: two Lives,’ London, 1858, 12mo.
* ‘History of France,’ Edinburgh, 1859, 8vo; 2nd ed. 1860.
* ‘History of England,’ London, 1860, 8vo.
Some translations from Schiller by White were published in ‘Blackwood's Magazine,’ xliii. 267, 684, 725.
[Burke's Landed Gentry, s.v. ‘White of Kellerstain;’ Gent. Mag. 1862, i. 651; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1715–1886; Foster's Index Eccles.; Allibone's Dict. of Engl. Lit.; Forster's Life of Dickens, ii. 394–6, iii. 104.]
E. I. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/White, Anthony

​WHITE, ANTHONY (1782–1849), surgeon, born in 1782 at Norton in Durham, a member of a family long resident in the county, was educated at Witton-le-Wear, and afterwards at Cambridge, where he graduated bachelor of medicine from Emmanuel College in 1804, having been admitted a pensioner on 18 May 1799. He was apprenticed to Sir Anthony Carlisle [q. v.], and was ​admitted a member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England on 2 Sept. 1803. He was elected an assistant-surgeon to the Westminster Hospital on 24 July 1806, surgeon on 24 April 1823, and consulting surgeon on 23 Dec. 1846. At the College of Surgeons he was elected a member of the council on 6 Sept. 1827, and two years later, 10 Sept. 1829, he was appointed a member of the court of examiners in succession to William Wadd [q. v.] In 1831 he delivered the Hunterian oration (unpublished), and he became vice-president in 1832 and again in 1840, serving the office of president in 1834 and 1842. He also filled the office of surgeon to the Royal Society of Musicians.
White suffered severely from gout in his later years, and died at his house in Parliament Street on 9 March 1849. As a surgeon he is remarkable because he was the first to excise the head of the femur for disease of the hip-joint, a proceeding then considered to be so heroic that Sir Anthony Carlisle and Sir William Blizard threatened to report him to the College of Surgeons. He performed the operation with complete success, and sent the patient to call upon his opponents. His besetting sin was unpunctuality, and he often entirely forgot his appointments, yet he early acquired a large and lucrative practice.
White published: 1. ‘Treatise on the Plague,’ &c., London, 1846, 8vo. 2. ‘An Enquiry into the Proximate Cause of Gout, and its Rational Treatment,’ London, 1848, 8vo; 2nd edit. 1848; American edit. New York, 1852, 8vo.
A three-quarter-length portrait in oils by T. F. Dicksee, engraved by W. Walker, was published on 20 Aug. 1852. A likeness by Simpson is in the board-room of the Westminster Hospital.
[Gent. Mag. 1849, i. 431; Lancet, 1849, i. 324.]
D’A. P.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/White, Henry (1812-1880)

​WHITE, HENRY (1812–1880), historical and educational writer, born on 23 Nov. 1812, was the son of Charles White of Minster Street, Reading. He was educated at Reading grammar school under Richard Valpy [q. v.], and proceeded to Trinity College, Cambridge. He also studied at the university of Heidelberg, where he obtained the degree of Ph.D. In the earlier part of his career, after working at Geneva with Merle d'Aubigné for some time, he was chiefly occupied with scholastic work, and published several historical text-books of considerable merit. Perhaps the best known is his ‘History of France,’ Edinburgh, 1850, 12mo, which attained an eighth edition in 1870. In 1858 he was appointed to superintend the compilation of the ‘Catalogue of Scientific Papers’ issued by the Royal Society, and was engaged in this work until his death. For some years he also acted as literary critic to the ‘Atlas’ during the editorship of Henry James Slack [q. v.]
In 1867 he published his most important book, ‘The Massacre of St. Bartholomew, preceded by a History of the Religious Wars in the Reign of Charles IX,’ London, 8vo, a work of genuine research. White's was the first English treatise to show that the massacre was the result of a sudden resolution, and not of a long-prepared conspiracy. The merits of his monograph were recognised by Alfred Maury, who reviewed it elaborately in the ‘Journal des Savants.’ White died in London on 5 Jan. 1880. In 1837 he married Elizabeth King of Boulogne-sur-Mer, and left issue.
Besides the works already mentioned, White was the author of:
* ‘Elements of Universal History,’ Edinburgh, 1843, 12mo; 13th ed. Edinburgh, 1872, 8vo.
* ‘Outlines of Universal History,’ Edinburgh, 1853, 8vo; 10th ed. 1873, 12mo.
* ‘History of Great Britain and Ireland,’ Edinburgh, 1849, 12mo; 20th ed. 1879.
He also compiled several school histories, and between 1843 and 1853 translated Merle d'Aubigné's ‘History of the Reformation.’ In conjunction with Thomas W. Newton he prepared the ‘Catalogue of the Library of the Museum of Practical Geology,’ published in 1878.
[Information kindly given by Mr. Henry White's son, Mr. A. Hastings White; Allibone's Dict. of Engl. Lit.; Trübner's American, European, and Oriental Record, 1880, p. 12; Athenæum, 1880, i. 58.]
E. I. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/White, Francis (d.1711)

​WHITE, FRANCIS (d. 1711), original proprietor of White's Chocolate House, who may very probably have been of Italian origin with a name anglicised from Bianco, set up a chocolate house on the east side of St. James's Street, upon the site now occupied by 'Boodle's,' in 1693. It was perhaps started in rivalry with the tory ' Cocoa Tree ' at the west end of Pall Mall. White's customers grew more and more select and exclusive, and in 1697 he changed his quarters for others on the west side of the street. A number of the early 'Tatlers' of 1709 are dated from 'White's Chocolate-house' in accordance with Steele's announcement in the first number, 'All accounts of gallantry, pleasure, and entertainment shall be under the article of White's Chocolate-house; poetry under that of Will's Coffee-house; learning under the title of Grecian; foreign and domestic news you will have from St. James's Coffee-house.' We learn from the same authority that the charge for entrance at White's was sixpence, the charge at the majority of coffee-houses being only one penny. Francis White prospered in his business until his death in February 1711, in which month he was buried in St. James's, Piccadilly. By his will he left a sum of 2,500l., including legacies, to his sister Angela Maria, wife of Tomaso Casanova of Verona, and to his aunt Nicoletta Tomasi of Verona. The widow, Elizabeth White, carried on the chocolate-house, already established as the favourite resort in the new west end for aristocratic members of the whig party; she made it equally well known as a place for the sale of opera and masquerade tickets. Upon her death, shortly before 1730, the proprietorship fell to John Arthur, formerly assistant to Francis White. The famous club within the chocolate-house, the history of which is so intimately bound up with that of the oligarchic régime down to 1832, is believed to have originated about 1697, but the first list of rules and members is dated 1736. Long before this 'White's' had become notorious for betting and high play (cf. Swift, Essay on Education; Pope's 3rd Epistle, 'To Lord Bathurst;' and Hogarth, Rake's Progress, plates iv. and vi.: the plate last mentioned has reference to the fire by which the chocolate-house was burned to the ground in April 1733, see Daily Courant, 30 April). In 1755 the club was removed to the 'great house' in St. James's Street (east side) the premises in which it still flourishes.
T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Blunt, Arthur Cecil

​BLUNT, ARTHUR CECIL (1844–1896), actor. [See Cecil, Arthur.]
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Bodichon, Barbara Leigh Smith

​BODICHON, BARBARA LEIGH SMITH (1827–1891), benefactress of Girton College, was the eldest child of Benjamin Smith [see under Smith, William, 1756–1835], and was born at Wathington, Sussex, on 8 April 1827. She early showed artistic ability and was taught water-colour drawing by William Henry Hunt [q. v.] and other artists, and was taken to visit J. M. W. Turner in his studio. Her father's political associations made her acquainted with most of the anti-corn-law politicians, and she took great interest in all questions relating to the education of women and the general improvement of their position in the state. She wrote a very brief but lucid pamphlet on the laws relating to women, which was of service in procuring the passing of the Married Woman's Property Act. She had a house in Algiers, and in 1857 married Dr. Eugene Bodichon, whom she had met there. He died in 1886, and they had no children. She built for herself a small house at Sealands Gate, in Sussex, and had also a house in London, 5 Blandford Square, and at all her residences exercised much hospitality. William Allingham, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Bell Scott, Richard Cobden, and their friends were often her guests, and she was a friend of Marian Evans, best known as George Eliot. She recognised the authorship of 'Adam Bede,' and wrote at once to the authoress, who afterwards gave her a copy of the three volumes inscribed 'To Barbara L. S. Bodichon, the friend who first recognised me in this book, I give it as a remembrance of the moment when she cheered me by that recognition and by her joy in it.—George Eliot, 7 July 1859.' The personal description of Romola was drawn from George Eliot's recollections of her. She may justly be regarded as the foundress of Girton College, the plan of which was proposed by her between 1860 and 1870, and to which, when it began at Hitchin, she gave a thousand pounds, and afterwards bequeathed more than ten thousand pounds. She worked assiduously at water-colour painting, and often exhibited pictures. Her talent lay in open-air effects of sunlight and cloud, inland and on the coast, and such great artists as Corot, Daubeny, and Henry Moore admired her work.
She had a small house at Zennor in Cornwall, and while sketching there in May 1878 had an attack of hemiplegia. She partially recovered, but had further attacks and died at Scalands Gate, Sussex, in 1891. Her portrait was more than once painted, but never well, and the best likeness of her is a drawing by Samuel Laurence. Letters and accounts of her are in Mr. Cross's 'Life of George Eliot.'
[Personal knowledge; papers and letters.]
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Boase, George Clement

​BOASE, GEORGE CLEMENT (1829–1897), bibliographer, born at Chapel Street, Penzance, on 20 Oct. 1829, was the second son of John Josias Arthur Boase and younger brother of Charles William Boase [q. v. Suppl.] He was educated at Regent House academy and the grammar school at Penzance, and for a short time in 1844 at Bellevue House academy, Penryn. From that year to 1846 he was in a local bank at Penzance, from 1847 to 1850 he was with Nehemiah Griffiths, ship and insurance broker, at 2 White Hart Court, Lombard ​Street, London, and from 1850 to 1854 he was a clerk with Ransom & Co., bankers, at 1 Pall Mall East,
Boase sailed for Australia on 29 April 1854, and was at first corrector of the press on the 'Age' newspaper of Melbourne, then gold-digger at Simpson's Ranges, and next in a general store. During 1855–64 he was tutor with the Darchy family on the Murrumbidgee river, New South Wales, and on Lachlan river, and was also correspondent of the 'Sydney Morning Herald.' In 1864 he returned to England, and managed the business of Whitehead & Co., provision merchants, from 1865 to 1874, when he retired into private life and occupied himself in biographical and antiquarian literature. During these years of leisure he lived successively at 15 Queen Anne's Gate and at 36 James Street (now 28 Buckingham Gate), where he collected a unique library illustrative of the biography of the nineteenth century. He died at 13 Granville Park, Lewisham, on 1 Oct. 1897, and was buried at Ladywell cemetery on 5 Oct.
Boase was the joint author, with Mr. W. P. Courtney, of the 'Bibliotheca Cornubiensis' (1874–82, 3 vols.), and the sole author of a kindred volume, entitled 'Collectanea Cornubiensia' (1890). With his brothers he compiled the several editions of 'The Families of Boase or Bowes,' and helped in the compilation of the works on Exeter College by his brother, Charles William, and the 'Modern English Biography' of his youngest brother, Frederic. He compiled with Mr. W. P. Courtney, for Professor Skeat, the Cornish portion of the 'bibliographical list of the works in the various dialects of English' {English Dialect Soc. 1877), and he assisted the Rev. John Ingle Dredge in his tracts on Devonshire bibliography. He was a frequent contributor to 'Notes and Queries' and the 'Western Antiquary.' He supplied 723 memoirs to the 'Dictionary of National Biography,' the last appearing in vol. lix.
[Times, 5 Oct. 1897; Notes and Queries, 8th ser. xii. 301-2 (1897); Account of Boase Family; personal knowledge.]
W. P. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Alford, Marianne Margaret

​ALFORD, MARIANNE MARGARET, Viscountess Alford, generally known as Lady Maria Alford (1817–1888), artist, art patron, and author, elder daughter of Spencer Compton, second Marquis of Northampton [q. v.], by his wife Margaret, eldest daughter of Major-general Douglas Maclean-Clephane, was born in 1817 at Rome, where her father was then residing. Her childhood was spent in Italy, and thence she derived a love of that country which lasted throughout her life. She came to England in 1830 with her parents, but in later life returned to spend many winters in Rome. On 10 Feb. she was married at Castle Ashby to John Hume Oust, viscount Alford, elder son of John Cust, first Earl Brownlow, and the heir to a portion of the large estates of Francis Egerton, third and last Duke of Bridgewater [q. v.] In 1849 this property passed to Lord Alford, but he died in 1851, leaving his widow with two sons. A famous legal contest known as the Bridgewater Will Case followed Lord Alford's death, and his elder son's claim to succeed to the Bridgewater estates was warmly disputed, but was finally settled by the House of Lords in the young man's favour on 19 Aug. 1853.
Lady Marian Alford was an accomplished artist, inheriting her tastes in this direction from both her parents, and, although she enjoyed no regular education in art, her drawings and paintings attain a very high standard. Her house in London, Alford House, Prince's Gate, was built mainly from her own designs. She was also a liberal and intelligent patron of artists in England and Italy, and a friend of the leading artists of the day. She was especially interested in needlework, both as a fine art and as an employment for women, and it was greatly through her influence and personal efforts that the Royal School of Art Needlework in Kensington took its rise. For many years ​she collected materials for a history of needlework, which she published in handsome form in 1886 under the title of 'Needlework as Art.' In society, as well as in art circles, Lady Marian Alford was noted for refinement and dignity, and for her powers of conversation. She died at her son's house, Ashridge, Berkhampstead, on 8 Feb. 1888, and was buried at Belton near Grantham. Of her two sons the elder, John William Spencer Brownlow Egerton-Cust, succeeded his grandfather as second Earl Brownlow, and, dying unmarried in 1867, was succeeded by his younger brother, Adelbert Wellington Brownlow Cust, third and present Earl Brownlow.
L. C.