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

​ROBERTS, EMMA (1794?–1840), author, born about 1794, was the posthumous daughter of Captain William Roberts, at one time in the Russian service, and afterwards paymaster in an English regiment. Her uncle, Thomas Roberts, raised the 111th regiment in 1794, and became a general in 1814. Her girlhood was spent with her mother, a lady of some literary pretensions, at Bath. Later on, when studying at the British Museum, she made the acquaintance of Lætitia E. Landon (L. E. L.). Her first book, ‘Memoirs of the Rival Houses of York and Lancaster,’ was published in 1827. In the following year, after her mother's death, she went out to India with her sister, who had married Captain Robert Adair McNaghten, 61st Bengal Infantry (retired 1839). ‘There cannot be,’ she wrote in one of her books, ‘a more wretched situation than that of a young woman in India who has been induced to follow the fortunes of her married sister under the delusive expectation that she will exchange the privations attached to limited means in England for the far-famed luxuries of the East.’ With the McNaghtens she lived at various stations in Upper India till 1831, when, her sister dying, she went to Calcutta. There she devoted herself more closely to literature and journalism, editing and writing for the ‘Oriental Observer.’ In 1832, when suffering from overwork, she returned to England. In London she wrote articles for the ‘Asiatic Journal,’ edited ‘A New System of Domestic Cookery,’ 1840, and did other literary work. In September 1839 she started a second time for the East, undertaking to write an account of her outward voyage and of her observations in Western India for the ‘Asiatic Journal.’ Travelling by the overland route, an arduous adventure for a lady in those days, she reached Bombay in November, and, after a short stay at Government House, settled down in the suburb of Parell, where she set to work on a book about the presidency. She also became editor of a new weekly paper, ‘The Bombay United Service Gazette,’ and interested herself in a scheme for providing Indian women with suitable employment. When on a visit to Colonel Ovans, political resident at Sattara, in April 1840, she was taken ill, and, having been moved for change of air to Poona, died there at the house of her friend, Colonel Campbell, on 16 Sept. 1840. She had all but completed her investigations, and had arranged for her return home in October. A friend who had known her at Calcutta wrote that ‘she evinced less of what is known as blue than any one of her contemporaries, excepting Miss Landon.’
Besides the works noticed, she published: 1. ‘Oriental Scenes, Dramatic Sketches and Tales, with other Poems,’ Calcutta, 1830; another edition, London, 1832. 2. ‘Scenes and Characteristics of Hindostan,’ 3 vols. 1835, 12mo. 3. ‘The East India Voyager,’ London, 1839. 4. ‘Notes of an Overland Journey to Bombay’ (posthumous), London, 1841.
S. W.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Roberts, George (d.1860)

​ROBERTS, GEORGE (d. 1860), antiquary, was born at Lyme Regis, on the borders of Dorset, where he was chiefly educated. He afterwards kept a grammar school there in Broad Street, Cannon Liddon being one of his pupils. He acted as mayor of the town in 1848–9 and 1854–5. From the age of eleven he devoted himself to the history of the place and studied its archives. He spent much time in inspecting other manuscript records, and he soon became known to the literary world for his knowledge of local history. He corresponded with Sir Walter Scott and was occasionally consulted by Macaulay, who quoted him as an authority on the incidents of the invasion by the Duke of Monmouth. Hepworth Dixon, in his ‘Life of Admiral Blake,’ acknowledged obligations to Roberts. About 1857 he removed to Dover, where he died on 27 May 1860, aged 57.
Roberts published:
* ‘The History of Lyme Regis,’ 1823.
* ‘A Guide descriptive of the Beauties of Lyme Regis, with a Description of the Great Storm [of 23 Nov.] 1824,’ already published in the ‘Sherborne Mercury,’ and issued separately (1830).
* ‘History and Antiquities of the Borough of Lyme Regis and Charmouth,’ 1834 (incorporating a large part of No. 1. Two editions were issued, and to one of them was appended a tract on ‘The Municipal Government of Lyme Regis and an Account of the Corporation,’ which was also issued separately).
* ‘Etymological and Explanatory Dictionary of the Terms and Language of Geology,’ 1839; praised by Dean Buckland.
* ‘Account of the Mighty Landslip at Dowlands and Bindon, near Lyme Regis, on 25 Dec. 1839’ (1840). This tract went through five editions in that year.
* ‘Terms and Language of Trade and Commerce,’ 1841.
* ‘Life, Progresses, and Rebellion of James, Duke of Monmouth, with a full Account of the Bloody Assize,’ 1844, 2 vols.
* ‘The Social History of the People of the Southern ​Counties of England in Past Centuries,’ 1856, dedicated to Lord Macaulay, and mainly based on the archives of Lyme Regis and Weymouth, the proceedings of the Dorset County Sessions, 1625–37, and the proceedings before the Dorchester magistrates, 1654–1661. Its value has been acknowledged by successive historians.
Roberts edited for the Camden Society in 1848 the ‘Diary of Walter Yonge.’ From an autograph note in his copy of the ‘History of the Mutiny at Spithead and the Nore’ (1842), which is quoted in ‘Notes and Queries’ (5th ser. xii. 307, 355), it appears that he claimed to have compiled the original manuscript of that work. It was afterwards mutilated by William Johnson Neale [q. v.], to whom it is usually attributed.
[Gent. Mag. 1860, ii. 103, 201; Athenæum, 23 June 1860, p. 856; Mayo's Bibliotheca Dorset. pp. 168–70; Hutchins's Dorset (1864), ii. 50, 77.]
W. P. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Roberts, George (fl.1726)

​ROBERTS, GEORGE (fl. 1726), mariner, was the reputed author of ‘The Four Years' Voyages of Capt. George Roberts; being a Series of uncommon Events which befell him in a Voyage to the Islands of the Canaries, Cape de Verde, and Barbadoes … written by himself’ (8vo, 1726). According to this work, Roberts, after having been engaged for several years in the Guinea trade as captain of a ship, engaged himself in 1721 as chief mate for a voyage to Virginia, touching at Madeira, the Canaries, and Barbados. At Barbados, however, as the result of a difference of opinion with his captain, he fitted out a small sloop, in which he undertook a voyage to Guinea; but, being captured by pirates, who cleared the sloop out and detained his men, he was sent adrift, without sails, without provisions, and with no shipmates but a boy and a child. After various difficulties, the sloop was finally wrecked on the unfrequented island of St. John, one of the Cape Verd Islands, where Roberts remained two years, and got back to England in June 1725. It is suggested (Wilson, Life of Defoe, iii. 543) that the narrative is fictitious, and was written by Defoe, and this suggestion has been adopted in the British Museum ‘Catalogue.’ It seems unauthorised and unnecessary. The style is rather that of some humble and incompetent imitator of Defoe, whose story is very probably based on fact. No reason can be alleged for doubting the existence of Roberts or the substantial truth of the narrative. Watt, whom Allibone follows, seems to identify Roberts with a Mr. Roberts who was shipwrecked in 1692, and whose story of the disaster is published in Hacke's ‘Collection of Original Voyages’ (London, small 8vo, 1699); but Mr. Roberts, commander and part owner of the vessel wrecked in 1692, can scarcely have been less than sixty in 1722; whereas George Roberts is described as a man of about thirty-five. William Lee (Life of Defoe, &c.) makes no mention of Roberts's narrative, thus tacitly denying Defoe's connection with it.
[Authorities in text.]
J. K. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Roberts, Griffith

Gruffydd Robert in the ODNB.
​ROBERTS, GRIFFITH (fl. 1570), Welsh grammarian, was educated at the university of Siena, where he graduated M.D. In 1567 he published at Milan a Welsh treatise on grammar (in three parts) of about three hundred pages. Only two copies are now extant—one in the British Museum, the other at Peniarth. It was reprinted, with some omissions, at Carmarthen in 1857, and in its entirety as a supplement to the ‘Revue Celtique.’ In 1585 he published at Rouen a catholic religious manual, entitled ‘Y Drych Christianogawl’ (‘The Christian Mirror’). A tract entitled ‘The English Roman Life,’ printed in London in 1590, shows us ‘Dr. Robert Griffin’ as at that time confessor to Cardinal (Federigo) Borromeo (Harleian Miscellany, vii. 132). His friend Dr. Rosser Smith speaks of him in the preface to a Welsh work published in 1611 as ‘theological canon of the mother church of Milan.’
[Hanes Llenyddiaeth Gymreig, by Gweirydd ap Rhys; Llyfryddiaeth y Cymry; Tanner's Bibl. Brit.-Hib. p. 635; Williams's Eminent Welshmen.]
J. E. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Stack, Richard

​STACK, RICHARD (d. 1812), author, entered Trinity College, Dublin, as a sizar on 27 May 1766, and was elected a scholar in 1769. He graduated B.A. in 1770 and M.A. in 1779. In the same year he was elected a fellow of the college, and in 1783 he took the degree of B.D., receiving that of D.D. in 1786. He was appointed rector of Omagh, and died in 1812. He was vice-president of the Royal Irish Academy.
Stack was the author of: 1. ‘An Introduction to the Study of Chemistry,’ Dublin, 1802, 8vo. 2. ‘Lectures on the Acts of the Apostles,’ 2nd edit. London, 1805, 8vo, dedicated to Beilby Porteus [q. v.], bishop of London. 3. ‘Lectures on the Epistle to the Romans,’ Dublin, 1806, 8vo, dedicated to Porteus. Stack also made several contributions to the ‘Transactions’ of the Royal Irish Academy.
[Reuss's Register of Authors, 1770–90 p. 381, 1790–1803 ii. 348; Dict. of Living Authors, 1816; Allibone's Dict. of Authors; Index to Transactions of the Royal Irish Acad. 1813.]
E. I. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/St. Quintin, William

​ST. QUINTIN, Sir WILLIAM (1660?–1723), politician, born about 1660 at Harpham in the East Riding of Yorkshire, was the eldest son of William St. Quintin, who died in the lifetime of his father, by Elizabeth, youngest daughter of Sir William Strickland, bart., of Boynton, Yorkshire. Having succeeded his grandfather, Sir Henry St. Quintin, second baronet of Harpham, some time before 1698, he entered the House of Commons at the general election of 1695 as representative of the borough of Kingston-upon-Hull, for which he served in eleven successive parliaments until his death (Parliamentary Returns; Luttrell, Brief Relation). On 24 Dec. 1700 Sir William lay ‘dangerously ill of a feavour’ (ib.). He was a commissioner of customs with a salary of 1,000l. a year from 22 Nov. 1698 to 18 Dec. 1701 (Haydn, Book of Dignities), when, in consequence of a clause in an act of parliament passed the preceding session for disabling the commissioners from sitting in parliament, he resigned his office. From 1706 he was a commissioner of revenue in Ireland with the same salary until 4 Feb. 1713, shortly after which (1714–17) he acted as a lord of the treasury in England. In July 1717 he became a commissioner of the alienation office, and on 16 June 1720 was appointed to the lucrative office of joint vice-treasurer, receiver-general, and ​paymaster of Ireland, which he enjoyed until his death on 30 June 1723. Sir William, who was a capable official, was succeeded in the title by his nephew, also Sir William, on whose son's death in 1795 the baronetcy became extinct.
[Burke's Extinct Baronetage; Liber Hiberniæ; Haydn's Book of Dignities; Historical Register.]
W. R. W.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Stack, Edward

​STACK, EDWARD (d. 1833), general, born in Ireland, came of a family styled Stack de Crotto, three members of which served in the French army during the eighteenth century (O'Hart, Irish Pedigrees, ii. 809). He entered the French army in early life, and became an aide-de-camp of Louis XV. In 1777 he became lieutenant and accompanied La Fayette to America to aid the English colonists in their revolt. He was on board Le Bonhomme Richard on 23 Sept. 1779, when her commander, Paul Jones [q. v.], captured the Serapis in the North Sea. Soon after he was placed in command of Dillon's regiment in the Irish brigade, and proceeded to the West Indies, where he served under the Marquis de Bouillé, governor of the Windward Islands, and assisted in taking the islands of Tobago, St. Christopher, Nevis, and Montserrat from the English. He was promoted captain in 1789, and for his services in America was made Chevalier de St. Louis and Chevalier de Cincinnatus d'Amérique. He remained in Dillon's regiment until the French revolution, when he entered the British service as an officer of the Irish brigade. He became lieutenant-colonel in the 5th regiment on 1 Oct. 1794. The brigade was disbanded in 1798, but he was promoted to a colonelcy on half-pay on 1 Jan. 1801. On the rupture of the treaty of Amiens in 1803 he was one of those detained in France by Bonaparte, and was first imprisoned at Biche for three years, and then at Verdun. In 1804 he was detected while executing secret service for the English government, and was to have been shot with the Duc d'Enghien, but was reprieved at the last minute. He was released in 1814 on the restoration of the Bourbons. While in captivity he was promoted to the rank of major-general in the British army on 25 April 1808, and to that of lieutenant-general on 4 Jan. 1813. After his release he was made a general on 22 July 1830, and died at Calais, at a great age, in December 1833.
[Gent. Mag. 1834, i. 225; Alger's Englishmen in the French Revolution, p. 356; Army Lists.]
E. I. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Stackhouse, Thomas (1756-1836)

​STACKHOUSE, THOMAS (1756–1836), antiquary and theologian, son of Daniel Stackhouse, who married, at Cockermouth, in 1755, Margaret Morland, and grandson of Thomas Stackhouse (1677?–1752) [q. v.], vicar of Benham, was born at Cockermouth on 27 Sept. 1756. He was educated by his uncle, Thomas Stackhouse the younger, ​and was himself engaged in tuition at Liverpool. He is said to have sculptured the figure of painting over the Shakespeare Gallery in Pall Mall, London. His hobby lay in investigating the remains of the early inhabitants of Britain, and he published two works on that subject. After walking ‘considerably above a hundred miles … among the barrows’ near Weymouth and Dorchester, he wrote ‘Illustration of the Tumuli, or Ancient Barrows’ (1806), which was dedicated to William George Maton, M.D. [q. v.], His second work, the result of visits to the earthworks and remains in the southern counties, ranging from Tunbridge Wells to Bath, was ‘Two Lectures on the Remains of Ancient Pagan Britain’ (1833), of which seventy-five copies were struck off for private distribution. He also published ‘Views of Remarkable Druidical Rocks near Todmorton,’ presumably Todmorden, near Rochdale. Stackhouse joined the Society of Friends, and his speech at the eleventh annual meeting of the Peace Society is reported in the ‘Herald of Peace’ (vol. vi. 1827). He died at Chapel Road, Birdcage Fields, St. John's parish, Hackney, on 29 Jan. 1836, and was buried, with his wife, at Park Street burial-ground, Stoke Newington, on 4 Feb. His wife Ruth, daughter of John and Ruth Fell of Blennerhasset, Cumberland, whom he married at Liverpool on 18 Dec. 1783, died at Stamford Hill on 16 Feb. 1833, aged 76. They had issue three sons and two daughters.
Other works by Stackhouse were: 1. ‘A New Essay on Punctuation,’ 1800, 3rd edit. 1814. 2. ‘An Appendix and Key to the Essay on Punctuation,’ 1800. 3. ‘The Rationale of the Globes,’ 1805. 4. ‘Horne Tooke revived; or an Explanation of the Particles of and for,’ 1813. 5. ‘Sacred Genealogy; or the Ancestry of Messiah’ (anon.), 1822. 6. ‘Thoughts on Infidelity,’ 1823. 7. ‘Biblical Researches, with an Explanation of Daniel's Seventy Weeks,’ 1827. 8. ‘Astronomical Discourses for Schools and Families,’ 1831. 9. ‘The Eclipsareon: a Diagram of the Times in which Eclipses may happen in any given Year.’ 10. ‘The Zodiacal Chart.’ 11. ‘Key to the Egyptian Hieroglyphic Alphabet.’ Stackhouse left in manuscript ‘Historical, Doctrinal, and Obituary Notices of the Society of Friends.’
W. P. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Strange, Roger le

Roger Lestrange in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
​STRANGE, ROGER le (d. 1311), judge, was a descendant of Guy Le Strange, who is thought to have been a younger son of Hoel II, duke of Brittany (1066–1084). He was sheriff of Yorkshire during the last two years of the reign of Henry III, and the first two of that of Edward I. In the last of these years he was prosecuted for various extortions committed while he was bailiff of the honour of Pec in Derbyshire. In 1279–1280 he was appointed steward of the king's household, and in 1282 captain of the king's forces in the fortresses of Whitchurch in Shropshire, Oswestry, and Montgomery (Parl. Writs, i. 243). In the latter capacity in December he is said to have slain Llewelyn near Builth (‘Opus Chronicorum’ in Trokelowe's Chronica, Rolls Ser. p. 40); the honour is, however, claimed by others [cf. art. Llywelyn ab Gruffydd]. On 21 Oct. 1283 he became justice of the forest on this side of Trent, and on 1 Aug. 1285 justice in eyre of the forest for the county of Derby. In 1287 he was despatched into Wales at the head of an expedition against Rhys ab Mereduc or Maredudd, and was ordered to reside in his lordships situated on the Welsh border until the rebellion was suppressed. He was summoned to a council held by Edmund, earl of Cornwall, who was acting as regent in the king's absence, on 13 Oct. 1288. In 1290 he is referred to as late bailiff of Builth. Towards the end of October or beginning of November 1291 he was sent with Lewis de la Pole to the court of Rome as the king's messenger. He was still staying abroad on the king's service on 18 April 1292. He was summoned to parliament in 1295, 1296, and 1297. In this latter year he surrendered the office of justice of the forest on account of ill-health, and on 11 May 1298 he nominated attorneys for two years for the same reason. He is, however, spoken of on 10 July 1301 as lately appointed to assess the king's wastes in his forests beyond Trent, and he joined in the letter of the barons on 12 Feb. 1301 respecting Scotland. He died between 8 July and 7 Aug. 1311 (Cal. Close Rolls Edw. II, 1318–23, p. 70; Abbreviatio Rotulorum Originalium, i. 182). He was lord of the manors of Ellesmere and Chesworthine in Shropshire, held for life by the gift of the king the manor of Shotwick in Cheshire, and was tenant by courtesy of a third part of the barony of Beauchamp.
[Foss's Judges of England, iii. 157; Calendar of Patent Rolls, Edw. I, 1281–92 pp. 84, 187, 401, 443, 447, 485, 1292–1301 pp. 350, 526; Annales Londonienses, in Stubbs's Chronicles of Edw. I and Edw. II, i. 123; Parl. Writs, i. 18, 195, 222, 234, 243, 251, 253; authorities cited in text.]
W. E. R.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Strange, Thomas Lumisden

​STRANGE, THOMAS LUMISDEN (1808–1884), judge and writer, born on 4 Jan. 1808, was eldest son of Sir Thomas Andrew Lumisden Strange [q. v.] He was educated at Westminster school, and on leaving in 1823 went out to his father in India, becoming a writer in the East India Company's civil service at Madras in 1825. He was appointed an assistant-judge and joint criminal judge on 24 June 1831, became sub-judge at Calicut in 1843 and civil and sessions judge at Tellicherry in 1845, was a special commissioner for investigating the Molpah disturbances in Malabar in 1852, and for inquiring into the system of judicature in the presidency of Madras in 1859, and was made judge of the high court of judicature in 1862. He resigned on 2 May 1863. He compiled a ‘Manual of Hindoo Law,’ 1856, taking his father's work as a basis. This reached a second edition in 1863. He also published ‘A Letter to the Governor of Fort St. George on Judicial Reform’ (1860).
While in India he was much interested in religious subjects. In 1852 he published ‘The Light of Prophecy’ and ‘Observations on Mr. Elliott's “Horæ Apocalypticæ.”’ Subsequently he was so impressed by observing a supposed convert at the gallows proclaim his faith to be in Rama, not in Christ, that, on examining Christian evidence, his own faith in Christianity broke down. He never ceased to be a pious theist. He explained his position in ‘How I became and ceased to be a Christian,’ and many other pamphlets for the series published in 1872–1875 by Thomas Scott (1808–1878) [q. v.]; these publications were afterwards collected ​and issued as ‘Contributions to a Series of Controversial Writings’ (1881). Larger works by Strange were: 1. ‘The Bible: is it the Word of God?’ 1871. 2. ‘The Speaker's Commentary reviewed,’ 1871. 3. ‘The Legends of the Old Testament traced to their apparent Primitive Sources,’ 1874. 4. ‘The Development of Creation on the Earth,’ 1874. 5. ‘The Sources and Development of Christianity,’ 1875. 6. ‘What is Christianity?’ 1880. Though far from a brilliant writer, he was a diligent student, and was always an earnest advocate of practical piety in life and conduct. Strange died at Norwood on 4 Sept. 1884.
J. M. W.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Strangeways, James

​STRANGEWAYS, Sir JAMES (d. 1516), speaker of the House of Commons, was the son of Sir James Strangeways of Whorlton, Yorkshire, by his wife Joan, daughter of Nicholas Orrell. The elder Sir James was appointed judge of the common pleas in 1426. The younger was high sheriff of Yorkshire in 1446, 1453, and 1469. He was returned for the county to the parliaments of 1449 and 1460, and, on account of his devotion to the house of York, was appointed speaker of the House of Commons in the first parliament of Edward IV, which met in November 1461. For the first time in English history the speaker addressed the king, immediately after his presentation and allowance, in a long speech reviewing the state of affairs and recapitulating the history of the civil war. The parliament transacted hardly any business beyond numerous acts of attainder against various Lancastrians. It was prorogued to 6 May 1462, and then dissolved. He served on various commissions for the defence of the kingdom and suppression of rebellions, and sat regularly on the commissions of the peace for the North and West Ridings of Yorkshire (Cal. Pat. Rolls, 1461–7, passim). On 11 Dec. 1485, among other grants, Sir James received from Henry VII the manor of Dighton in Yorkshire, from which it would appear that he was one of those who early espoused the Tudor cause (Campbell, Materials for a History of the Reign of Henry VII, Rolls Ser., i. 212, 530). He was appointed a knight of the body by Henry VIII, and in 1514 was one of the sheriffs for Yorkshire. He seems to have received several fresh grants of land, but it is difficult to distinguish him from another James Strangeways, residing in Berkshire, who also enjoyed the royal favour (Brewer, Letters and Papers of Henry VIII, vols. i. and ii. indexes). Sir James died in 1516, and was buried in the abbey church of St. Mary Overy's, Southwark. His will was proved on 9 Jan. 1516–17 (ib. ii. 752, 1380). He married Elizabeth, daughter and coheiress of Philip, lord Darcy, by whom he had seventeen children. His eldest son, Sir Richard Strangeways, died before him in 1488, and he was succeeded by his grandson, Sir James Strangeways.
E. I. C.