# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Story, George Warter

1904 Errata appended.
​STORY, GEORGE WARTER (d. 1721), historian, was eldest son of Thomas Story of Justice Town, near Carlisle. Thomas Story [q. v.], the quaker, was a younger brother. In 1688 George Story was chaplain to the Countess-dowager of Carlisle at Castle Howard. He was in London when the army for Ireland was being raised in March and April 1689, and accompanied Meinhard, duke of Schomberg [q. v.], in August as chaplain to Sir Thomas Gower's regiment of foot. Gower died early in 1690, and Henry, third earl of Drogheda, succeeded him in the command (see Lodge, Peerage, ed. Archdall, ii. 110), the survivors of two regiments being fused into one. Story was an admirer and apologist of Schomberg, who was much criticised for his unwillingness to risk raw troops in a pitched battle, and for the number of men lost by disease.
Story was at the Boyne [see under Sarsfield, Patrick], and served with Lord Drogheda while the war lasted. A younger brother, who was ensign in the same regiment, was killed near Birr in June 1691. ‘This officer,’ says the chaplain, ‘was well and at liberty at nine o'clock in the morning, but before twelve he was not only in the power, but buried by his enemies, and that with great formality. And a man that is at the pains to describe other people's actions may be allowed the liberty to leave one page to the memory of his own brother.’ After the surrender of Limerick in November 1691, Story's regiment went to Ulster, ‘the poor men enduring a great deal of hunger and hardship in so long a march,’ and when the war was quite over they remained in the northern province as part of the standing army.
In December 1694 Story was appointed dean of Connor. Subsequently he sometimes visited Carlisle, where he had a living, his curate being a deprived Scots episcopal clergyman whom Story's father took into his own house (Story, Journal, p. 51). On 7 April 1705 Story was instituted dean of Limerick and removed from Connor. On 23 Oct. 1714 he preached in London at St. Dunstan's in Fleet Street, being the day appointed by the Irish parliament to give thanks for deliverance from the massacre of 1641. He urged the Irish protestants, who formed his congregation, and who belonged to both political parties, to bury the hatchet in Queen Anne's grave and to unite in support of the Hanover succession. The sermon was published ‘at the request of the stewards and several of the gentlemen of Ireland.’ Story was careful of the privileges of his church, and in 1715 established his right to swear in the vicars-choral, notwithstanding the usurpation of successive bishops. In June 1716 he entertained his brother Thomas at Limerick. Story died on 19 Nov. 1721. He had inherited Justice Town, and left it to his widow, who sold it to Thomas Story in 1723. She was Catherine, daughter and coheiress of Edward Warter of Bilboa, near Doon, co. Limerick. The Warters' residence had been burned by some of Sarsfield's men, and they estimated their loss by the war at over 13,000l. (Lenihan, Hist. of Limerick, p. 283).
Story's ‘History,’ by far the most important authority for the war in Ireland on the Williamite side, is scarce. The first part, entitled ‘An Impartial History,’ which goes down to January 1690–1, was licensed in London on 30 April 1691. A second edition was published with the ‘Continuation’ early in 1693. The ‘Continuation’ has useful maps—some by Captain Samuel Hobson, ‘who drew the most exact map of Londonderry.’ Story dedicated the later work to William himself; ‘though I'm no soldier, yet four years' conversation with men of that profession has emboldened me to address your sacred Majesty.’ His account ends with the official close of the war by proclamation on 23 March 1691–2. Story leaves us in no doubt about his protestant and whig principles, but he is fair on the whole.
[Journal of Thomas Story, the Quaker, Newcastle-on-Tyne, 1747; Cotton's Fasti Ecclesiæ Hibernicæ. Story's movements during the Irish war may be traced in his History.]
R. B-l.
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.259 N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
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