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

​PELGRIM, JOYCE (fl. 1514), stationer in London, is first heard of in 1504, when an edition of the ‘Ortus Vocabulorum’ was printed for him in Paris. In 1506, in partnership with another stationer, Henry Jacobi, he issued a book of hours and a psalter according to the use of Sarum, and an edition of Lyndewode's ‘Provinciale.’ From the colophons of these books it is clear that Jacobi lived at the sign of the Trinity, and Pelgrim at the sign of St. Anne, both in St. Paul's Churchyard. Under the patronage of William Bretton, an important merchant of the staple of Calais, who assisted them with money, they worked in partnership for a few years, having books printed for them both in the Low Countries and in France. After 1508, when they had issued seven books, the name of Pelgrim no longer appears in connection with the business, though Jacobi still continued at work. About 1513 the latter moved to Oxford, and ​opened a shop there under his old sign of the Trinity, but died in the following year. William Bretton, as a creditor, applied for letters of administration, and was represented at Oxford by his agent, Joyce Pelgrim. Nothing further is known of Pelgrim.
E. G. D.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Peile, Thomas Williamson

​PEILE, THOMAS WILLIAMSON (1806–1882), author and divine, eldest son of John Peile of Whitehaven, a justice of the peace for Cumberland, was born 10 Nov. 1806. He was educated under Dr. Butler at Shrewsbury, where he followed B. H. Kennedy as captain of the school, and in 1824 entered Trinity College, Cambridge. After gaining the Davies scholarship in his freshman's year, he graduated B.A. in 1828 as eighteenth wrangler and bracketed second in the first class of the classical tripos. He was also second chancellor's medallist. On 1 Oct. 1829 he was elected fellow of his college, and proceeded M.A. in 1831, and D.D. in 1843.
In 1829 Peile was appointed head-master of the Liverpool collegiate school, and in the same year was ordained by Bishop Sumner of Chester. In 1831 he became perpetual curate of St. Catherine's, Liverpool. In 1834 he removed to Durham to hold a tutorship in the newly constituted university. In 1836 he was appointed to the perpetual curacy of Croxdale, near Durham.
From 1841 to 1854 Peile was head-master of Repton school, when he was succeeded by Steuart Adolphus Pears [q. v.] Towards the close of 1857 he became vicar of Luton, ​Bedfordshire, a large and populous parish, which he began dividing into districts. But as the task proved too great for his strength, he removed in October 1860 to the newly formed parish of St. Paul, South Hampstead. This he held till 1873, when he resigned. He resided in the district till his death on 29 Nov. 1882.
Peile was a sound scholar, and his knowledge of the classics, especially Thucydides and the Greek Testament, was remarkable. His principal works were: 1. Editions of the ‘Agamemnon of Æschylus’ 1839, ‘Choephori,’ 1840. 2. ‘Annotations on the Apostolical Epistles,’ 4 vols. 1851–2. 3. ‘Sermons, doctrinal and didactic,’ 1868. 4. ‘Three Sermons on the Holy Communion,’ 1871.
In 1831 he married Mary, daughter of James Braithwaite, esq. (who died in 1806), and by her, who survived him till 1890, he left a numerous family. A portrait of Dr. Peile is in the hall of Repton school.
J. H. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Pelham, Edmund

​PELHAM, Sir EDMUND (d. 1606), chief baron of the exchequer in Ireland, was the fifth son of Sir William Pelham (1486?–1538) of Laughton, Sussex, by his second wife, Mary, daughter of Lord Sandys of the Vine, near Basingstoke. His eldest uterine brother was Sir William Pelham (d. 1587) [q. v.] Edmund, or Edward, as his name is frequently given, was admitted a member of Gray's Inn in 1563; he was autumn reader for that society in 1588. He was elected member of parliament for Hastings on 22 Oct. 1597, and in 1601 was appointed serjeant-at-law. On the removal of Sir Robert Napier (d. 1615) [q. v.] for neglect of his duties, Pelham was appointed chief baron of the exchequer in Ireland in September 1602; at the same time he was sworn of the privy council. In the summer of 1603 he went on circuit through Ulster; it was the first time that an English judge had been seen in the north of Ireland, and Pelham reported that ‘the multitude that had been subject to oppression and misery did reverence him as if he had been a good angel sent from heaven, and prayed him upon their knees to return again to minister justice unto them’ (Cal. State Papers, Ireland, 1603–6, p. 111). Pelham's appointment was confirmed on James's accession, and on 3 July 1604 he was knighted by the king at Greenwich. On 20 Oct. 1604 he was placed on a commission to inquire into the waste suffered by Sir Henry Harington's lands during the war. From 5 March to 5 April 1605 he went on circuit through Meath, Westmeath, Longford, King's County, Athlone, and Queen's County; illness seems thenceforth to have prevented the exercise of his judicial functions. In 1606 he went to England, and on his return died at Chester on 4 June. He was possessed of the manor of Catsfield, Sussex, and left a son, Herbert Pelham, of the age of nineteen and upwards, ancestor of the Pelhams of Catsfield. In Chichester's opinion, Pelham was a ‘very learned and worthy judge.’
His brother, Sir Nicholas Pelham (1517–1560), eldest son of Sir William Pelham by his first wife, Mary, daughter of Sir Richard Carew of Beddington, Surrey, made himself conspicuous by his defence of Seaford against a French invasion under Claude d'Annabant in 1545 (Lower, Memorials of Seaford, p. 16; Archæologia, xxiv. 293). From 1547 to 1552 he represented Arundel in parliament, and in 1549 was sheriff of Sussex and Surrey, and was knighted. He was elected knight of the shire for Sussex on 16 Jan. 1557–8, and died, in his forty-fourth year, on 15 Dec. 1560. He was buried in St. Michael's Church, Lewes, under a handsome mural monument, with an inscription which records his repulse of the French. By his wife Anne, daughter of John Sackville, he had ten children, of whom the second son, Sir Thomas, became ancestor of the earls of Chichester.
A. F. P.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Johnson, John Noble

​JOHNSON, JOHN NOBLE, M.D. (1787–1823), biographer of Linacre, son of John Johnson, physician, of Aylesbury, entered at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, on 23 May 1803, aged 16 (Foster, Alumni Oxonienses). He graduated B.A. 1807, M.A. 1810, M.B. 1811, and M.D. 1814. He became a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in 1815, and was Gulstonian lecturer at the college in 1816. In 1818 he was elected physician to the Westminster Hospital, but resigned his office in 1822, and died on 6 Oct. 1823 at the Albany, London. Before his death he had completed an admirable ‘Life of Thomas Linacre [q. v.]’, founder of the College of Physicians, with memoirs of his cotemporaries. It was published in 1835; edited by Robert Graves, barrister-at-law.
[Munk's Coll. of Phys. iii. 136; Gent. Mag. 1835, new ser. iii. 633.]
G. T. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Johnson, Joseph

1904 Errata appended.
​JOHNSON, JOSEPH (1738–1809), bookseller and publisher, was the younger of two sons of a baptist farmer living at Everton, near Liverpool, where young Johnson was born on 15 Nov. 1738. He came to London in 1752, and some time afterwards was apprenticed to George Keith, bookseller, of Gracechurch Street. About 1760 he took a shop in Fish Street Hill, and was subsequently in partnership, first with a Mr. Davenport, and then with John Payne. Johnson and Payne had a house in Paternoster Row, which, with their stock, was burnt in 1770. Friends set Johnson up in a shop in St. Paul's Churchyard, where he remained, without a partner, until his death. In 1772 he issued the poems of Anna Letitia Aikin (Mrs. Barbauld), and about the same time began to publish for Dr. Priestley. He brought out many important works in medicine and surgery, and was the earliest publisher of Cowper and Erasmus Darwin. He also published for Horne Tooke, Dr. Aikin, Enfield, Fuseli, Bonnycastle, Mary Wollstonecraft, and Miss Edgeworth. In May 1788 he produced the first number of the ‘Analytical Review,’ which came to an end in 1799. He was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment and fined 50l. in 1797 for selling a pamphlet by Gilbert Wakefield. ​For many years before his death he was considered the father of the book trade.
Johnson died unmarried on 20 Dec. 1809, in his seventy-first year, and was buried in Fulham Church (see inscription in T. Faulkner, Account of Fulham, 1813, pp. 113–14). He had a country house at Purser's Cross, Fulham (ib. p. 321).
H. R. T.
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.169 N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
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# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Johnson, Martin

​JOHNSON, MARTIN (d. 1686?), seal-engraver and landscape-painter, was especially noted for his skill in engraving seals and medals (see Evelyn, Sculptura). He is stated to have used the graver only, and not a punch, like his rival, Thomas Simon [q. v.] Johnson was also a landscape-painter of some repute, and his works were much appreciated by his contemporaries. He died in London about 1686.
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Johnson, Richard (d.1721)

​JOHNSON, RICHARD (d. 1721), grammarian, was a fellow-student at St. John's College, Cambridge, with Richard Bentley (1662–1742) [q. v.] They both graduated B.A. in 1679. Johnson took no higher degree, though in his ‘Grammatical Commentaries’ he styles himself M.A. He was head-master of the free school at Nottingham from 1707 to 1718. At one period the corporation endeavoured to eject him for incompetency, and urged through their counsel at the trial that much learning had made him mad; but Johnson won his case by producing a certificate of ability to teach, which he had obtained from the trustees under pretence of applying for another appointment. There is no doubt, however, that he was suffering from mental disease. He drowned himself in the small stream which runs through Nottingham meadows, known locally as Tinker's Leen, in October 1721, and was buried at St. Nicholas, Nottingham, on the 26th of that month.
He was an uncommonly accurate Latin scholar, and his attack on Bentley's ‘Horace,’ despite its virulent personalities, is a very scholarly production (see No. 6 below). His works are: 1. ‘A Treatise of the Genders of Latin Nouns, by way of Examination of Lilly's Grammar Rules, commonly called Propria quæ maribus. Being a Specimen of Grammatical Commentaries, intended to be published … upon the whole Grammar,’ London, 1703, 8vo. 2. ‘Grammatical Commentaries; being an Apparatus to a new National Grammar, by way of Animadversion upon the Falsities, Obscurities, Redundancies, and Defects of Lilly's System now in use; in which also are noticed many Errors of the most eminent Grammarians, both antient and modern,’ London, 1706, 8vo. 3. ‘A Defence of the Grammatical Commentaries against the Animadversions of E. Leeds (under the name of “An Old Man”),’ London, 1707, 8vo. 4. ‘Cursus Equestris Nottinghamiensis: carmen hexametrum,’ London, 1709, 4to. 5. ‘Noctes Nottinghamicæ, or Cursory Objections against the Syntax of the Common Grammar, in order to obtain a better: Design'd in the mean time for the use of Schools,’ Nottingham, 1714 and 1718, 8vo. 6. ‘Aristarchus Anti-Bentleianus: Quadraginta Sex Bentleii Errores super Q. Horatii Flacci Odarum Libro primo, spissos nonnullos, et erubescendos: item per notas universas in Latinitate fœdissimos Nonaginta ostendens,’ 2 parts, Nottingham, 1717, 8vo; described by Gilbert Wakefield as ‘replete with accuracy of erudition and sprightliness of wit.’ Bentley's biographer, Bishop Monk, admitted that ‘many of Johnson's strictures are well founded,’ though he protested against Johnson's abuse. 7. ‘Additions and Emendations to the Grammatical Commentaries. With a Reply to Mr. W. Symes,’ Nottingham [1718], 8vo.
T. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Johnson, John Mordaunt

​JOHNSON, JOHN MORDAUNT (1776?–1815), diplomatist, was a native of Dublin. He is said to have matriculated at Trinity College, Dublin, and afterwards at Trinity College, Cambridge, but left each university without taking any degree. His father dying in the spring of 1798, Johnson left Cambridge, and was gazetted an ensign in the 51st regiment of foot on 20 Sept. 1798. In January 1779 he purchased a lieutenancy in the same regiment, but, becoming disgusted with the monotony of barrack life, sold out in the autumn of the following year. He then went on the continent, where he became acquainted with the Duke of Brunswick, and ‘made himself perfect master of almost all the modern languages’ (Memoir, p. iii). In the spring of 1803 he returned to England, and subsequently went to Dublin, where he remained until the autumn of 1804. Going once more abroad, he spent three years ‘chiefly in Germany, cultivating the valuable connections which he had formed on his first excursion to the continent, and acquiring information on all subjects of continental policy’ (ib.) In the hope of obtaining an official appointment, he returned again to England, and became involved in financial embarrassments. Subsequently Spencer Perceval's attention was drawn to his abilities by the manuscript of ‘A Memoir on the Political State of Europe,’ which Johnson had written with a view to publication. After an interview with the prime minister Johnson obtained employment in the foreign office, and was constantly employed in confidential missions to the continent. After the peace of Paris of 1814 he was appointed British chargé d'affaires at Brussels, and upon the union of the Netherlands with Holland was promoted to the post of British consul at Genoa. He died at Florence, whither he had removed for the benefit of his health, on 10 Sept. 1815, aged 39, and was buried in the cemetery attached to the British factory, near Leghorn, on the following day. Johnson was unmarried. He was a man of agreeable manners, an excellent linguist, and remarkable for the extent and accuracy of his political information. He is said to have been ‘in close and friendly correspondence with the principal ministers and generals and leading public characters of almost all the states of Europe’ (ib. p. ix). A few extracts from some of his letters to his friends are appended to the memoir prefixed to ‘Bibliothecæ Johnsonianæ Pars Prima,’ 1817 (pp. xii–xxiii), and four of his letters on foreign politics are given in ‘The Correspondence and Despatches of Viscount Castlereagh,’ 1853 (3rd ser. i. 340–1, 350–1, 362–4, 503–4). He appears to have assumed the additional name of Mordaunt after leaving the army, as he is described as John Johnson in the ‘Army List.’ The first part of his library was sold by Evans of Pall Mall in June 1817.
[Bibliothecæ Johnsonianæ Pars Prima, 1817, containing a prefatory Memoir of Johnson; Gent. Mag. 1815 pt. ii. pp. 377, 1817 pt. i. pp. 521–6; Army Lists, 1780, 1799.]
G. F. R. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Johnson, Lawrence

Laurence Johnson in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
​JOHNSON, LAWRENCE (fl. 1603), engraver, was one of the earliest native engravers practising in England. In 1603 he engraved a title-page and portraits to Richard Knolles's ‘Generall Historie of the Turkes’ (printed by Adam Islip). The portraits are, with the exception of that of Tamerlane, copied from those engraved by Theodore de Bry for Boissard's ‘Vitæ et icones sultanorum turcicorum,’ published at Frankfort-on-the-Maine in 1596. Johnson also engraved in the same year a half-length portrait of James I, which is of extreme rarity.
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Skinner, John (1772-1839)

​SKINNER, JOHN (1772–1839), antiquary, born in 1772, was the son of Russell Skinner of Newtown House, Lymington, Hampshire, by his wife, Mary Page of Tottenham High Cross, Middlesex. He was educated at Cheam, and entered Trinity College, Oxford, on 16 Nov. 1790, graduating B.A. in 1794 and M.A. in 1797. In 1794 he went to Lincoln's Inn, but, determining to relinquish law, he took holy orders. After having been curate of South Brent, Somerset, for four months, he was instituted to the living of Camerton in the same county in September 1800.
Skinner was a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and devoted much time to antiquarian studies. He formed a large collection of Roman and native antiquities which had been discovered in the neighbourhood of his parish. He was also an enthusiastic etymologist, but his philological theories were extremely wild. He attempted to find a secret significance in every letter which entered into the composition of Celtic names, and in support of his theory wrote a work on the origin and analysis of language, which was not published. He committed suicide on 12 Oct. 1839. He left a son, Fitzowen Skinner, a barrister of Lincoln's Inn, and a daughter, Anna, married to William Robert Augustus Boyle of Lincoln's Inn.
Skinner contributed several papers on antiquarian subjects to the ‘Archæologia’ of the Society of Antiquaries, and to the ‘Gentleman's Magazine.’ He also left a record of his travels and researches in ninety-eight manuscript volumes, profusely illustrated with watercolour drawings, which he bequeathed to the British Museum on condition that they were not opened for fifty years (Addit. MSS. 33633–730). With the exception of a tour in Holland, 1788–9 (vol. i.), a tour in the north of England, 1825 (vols. li–lvii.), and a French tour (vols. lxxii–lxxix.), his journeys were confined to the south of England, and chiefly to Somerset and the neighbouring counties. The accounts of local antiquities are remarkably elaborate. The collection is prefaced by an introduction by the author, and the last two volumes contain an index.
Skinner's portrait was painted by George Patten [q. v.] Another portrait by S. C. Smith, executed for Sir Richard Hoare, was preserved at Stourbridge, Worcestershire.
E. I. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Skinner, Thomas (1804-1877)

​SKINNER, THOMAS (1804–1877), engineer, born at St. John's, Newfoundland, on 22 May 1804, was the son of Lieutenant-colonel William Thomas Skinner, R.A. (d. 1829), by his second wife, Mary, daughter of Dr. Monier of the royal artillery [for the father's family see under Skinner, William, (1700–1780)]. In 1811 Thomas was placed at school in England, and remained there until in 1818 he proceeded to Ceylon, and obtained a second lieutenancy in the Ceylon rifles. In 1820 he was employed in constructing two roads to Kandy, one by the Kaduganava Pass, the other through the Seven Kirles, and was thenceforth connected with that branch of public works. In 1825 he was appointed staff officer of the garrison of Colombo, and on 27 Nov. 1829 deputy assistant quartermaster-general of the forces in Ceylon. In 1832 he opened a road from Aripo, on the western coast of Ceylon, to Anarajaporo. In the following year the public works of the colony were transferred to the civil authorities, and Skinner accompanied the surveyor-general over the country to initiate him in his duties. Subsequently Skinner undertook a survey of the mountain zone, the result of which was embodied in a one-inch sketch-map of the Kandian provinces and in a general map of Ceylon. In 1836 he was promoted captain, and in the following year was employed to regulate the surveyor-general and civil engineer's department, which had fallen into great confusion. This business occupied him until 1840; but as the department became again disorganised when he ceased directing it, he was appointed permanent commissioner for the roads in Ceylon in 1841. In 1847 he retired from his regiment with the rank of major, and in 1850 the civil engineer's department was incorporated with his own. In 1859 he was appointed auditor-general, but in consequence of a difference of opinion with the governor, Sir Henry Ward, as to the cost of a railway from Colombo to Kandy, he was superseded in 1861, and returned to his former post of commissioner of public works, which he continued to hold until, in 1865, he resumed the duties of auditor-general.
Skinner retired to England in 1867, and was made a companion of the order of St. Michael and St. George on 15 Feb. 1869. He took up his residence at Bath, where he died at 7 Grosvenor Place on 24 July 1877. His services to Ceylon were very great in opening up the country and rendering overland transport possible. He married Georgina, daughter of Lieutenant-general George Burrell, C.B., on 19 Dec. 1838. By her he had, with other children, Monier Williams Skinner, now lieutenant-colonel, R.E.
Skinner was the author of an autobiography entitled ‘Fifty Years in Ceylon,’ edited by his daughter Annie Skinner (London, 1891, 8vo), to which his portrait is prefixed. The book contains an outline of the history of his branch of the Skinner family.
E. I. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Skinner, Matthew

​SKINNER, MATTHEW (1689–1749), serjeant-at-law, great-grandson of Bishop Robert Skinner [q. v.], was the third and youngest son of Robert Skinner of Welton, Northamptonshire, and of the Inner Temple, judge of the Marshalsea court, and ‘law reporter.’ Born on 22 Oct. 1689, Matthew entered Westminster school at the age of fourteen, and, being elected to a studentship at Christ Church, Oxford, matriculated on 18 June 1709, and entered himself a student of Lincoln's Inn two days afterwards. Having been called to the bar on 21 April 1716, he joined the Oxford circuit, and was chosen recorder of Oxford on 30 May 1721. In 1719 he purchased from Simon Urling (afterwards recorder of London), the place of one of the four common pleaders of the city of London, who then enjoyed the exclusive right and privilege of practising in the lord mayor's court; but this position he surrendered in 1722 to Thomas Garrard (afterwards common serjeant of London). So rapidly did his practice increase that he was called to the rank of serjeant-at-law in Easter term, 1 Feb. 1724, was made one of the king's serjeants on 11 June 1728, and became his majesty's prime (or first) serjeant by letters patent on 12 May 1734. He served as treasurer of Serjeants' Inn in 1728, and the same year published his father's ‘Reports of Cases decided in the Court of King's Bench, 33 Charles II to 9 William III.’ After making an unsuccessful attempt to enter parliament for Andover in 1727, Skinner, who resided at Oxford (1722–1739), was chosen member for that city at the general election of 1734, but on 26 Nov. 1738 vacated his seat on being appointed chief justice of Chester, and of the great sessions for the counties of Flint, Denbigh, and Montgomery, which judicial position, together with the recordership of Oxford, he occupied until his death. He was the second counsel for the crown in the prosecution of the rebels on the northern circuit in July 1746, and led for the crown at Lord Balmerino's trial in the House of Lords the same year.
Skinner married, in 1719, Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Whitfield of Watford Place, Hertfordshire, and, dying at Oxford on 21 Oct. 1749, was buried in the cathedral. His eldest son died on 8 April 1735; while another son, Matthew Skinner, was also a barrister of Lincoln's Inn, and was invited to the bench of that society on 28 Nov. 1782, but does not appear to have sat.
W. R. W.