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

​BEDDOME, BENJAMIN (1717–1795), writer of hymns, was the son of the Rev. John Beddome, baptist minister. Benjamin was born at Henley-in-Arden, South Warwickshire, 23 Jan. 1717, and received his education, first at an independent academy in Tenter Alley, Moorfields, London, and afterwards at the Baptist College, Bristol. He was intended for a surgeon, but felt it his duty to become a preacher of the gospel. In the year 1740 he entered upon his first and only ministerial charge at Bourton-on-the-Water, in East Gloucestershire, where he continued as pastor of the baptist church until his death. Beddome was distinguished by the fulness and accuracy of his biblical scholarship, but it is as a hymn-writer that he is best known. His hymns were composed to be sung after his sermons, being designed to illustrate the truths on which he had been preaching. A volume of his poetry, under the title 'Hymns adapted to Public Worship or Family Devotion,' comprising 830 pieces, was published in 1818. Selections from these are found in most of the hymnals now in use. Beddome wrote an 'Exposition on the Baptist Catechism,' which was published in 1752. Two posthumous volumes of discourses were also printed from his manuscripts, and appeared, the first in 1805, the second in 1835. This latter contained a memoir of the author. By his marriage with Miss Elizabeth Boswell, Beddome had two sons, Benjamin and Foskett, who, having prepared themselves for the medical profession, died prematurely at the ages respectively of 24 and 25 years. ​Beddome died at Bourton, the scene of his lifelong labours, on 3 Sept. 1795, aged 78 years. His personal character was marked by great urbanity and courtesy. To the sick and the poor he was exceedingly generous and charitable.
[Miller's Singers and Songs of the Church, 2nd ed. 1869; and Memoir prefixed to Sermons, 1835.]
W. B. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Noel, Roden Berkeley Wriothesley

​NOEL, RODEN BERKELEY WRIOTHESLEY (1834–1894), poet, born on 27 Aug. 1834, was the fourth son of Charles Noel, lord Barham, who was created in 1841 first Earl of Gainsborough. His mother Frances, second daughter of Robert Jocelyn, third earl of Roden, was his father's fourth wife. Noel graduated M.A. from Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1858. In 1863 he married, and in the same year issued his first volume of verse, ' Behind the Veil, and other Poems,' London, 8vo. His next book, ' Beatrice, and other Poems,' 1868, 8vo, in which the influence of Shelley was strongly marked, raised higher expectations. Like its successors, it was distinguished by high purpose and refined feeling; like them also, it lacked self-restraint, compression, form. Among his later volumes the want of inspiration and of melody is least felt in his pathetic 'Little Child's Monument,' 1881. The ablest of his critical writings was his sympathetic, if somewhat capricious, 'Essays upon Poetry and Poets,' London, 1886, 8vo, including papers on Chatterton, Byron, Shelley, Wordsworth, Keats, Hugo, Tennyson, and Walt Whitman. A selection from his poems, with a prefatory notice by his friend, Mr. Robert Buchanan, was issued in the series known as the 'Canterbury Poets' in 1892. From 1867 to 1871 Noel performed the duties of a groom of the privy chamber to Queen Victoria. He died very suddenly at Mainz on 26 May 1894. By his wife Alice, daughter of Paul de Broe, he left a son, Conrad Le Despencer Roden, and a daughter, Frances.
His writings, besides those mentioned, include:
* 'The Red Flag and other Poems,' 1872, 8vo.
* 'Livingstone in Africa: a Poem,' 1874, 16mo.
* 'The House of Ravensburg: a Drama,' in five acts and in verse, 1877.
* 'A Philosophy of Immortality,' 1882.
* 'Songs of the Heights and Deeps,' 1885, 8vo.
* 'A Modern Faust and other Poems,' 1888, 8vo.
* 'Life of Lord Byron' (Great Writers' Series), 1890, 8vo.
* 'Poor People's Christmas: a Poem,' 1890.
He also edited a 'Selection from the Poems of Edmund Spenser,' 1887, 8vo, and the 'Plays of Thomas Otway' for the Mermaid Series, 1888, 8vo.
[Art. by J. A. Symonds in Miles's Poets of the Nineteenth Century; Times, 28 May 1894; Athenaeum, Academy, and Saturday Review, 2 June 1894; Spectator, lix. 755; Noel's works in the Brit. Mus. Library.]
T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Noel, Thomas

​NOEL, THOMAS (1799–1861), poet, eldest son of the Rev. Thomas Noel, was born at Kirkby-Mallory on 11 May 1799. His father, who had been presented to the livings of Kirkby-Mallory and Elmsthorpe, both in Leicestershire, by his kinsman Thomas Noel, viscount Wentworth, in 1798, died at Plymouth on 22 Aug. 1854, at the age of seventy-nine. The son, who graduated B. A. from Merton College, Oxford, in 1824, issued in 1833 a series of stanzas upon proverbs and scriptural texts, entitled 'The Cottage Muse,' London (printed at Maidenhead), 8vo; and in 1841 'Village Verse' and 'Rymes and Roundelayes,' London, 8vo. The latter volume includes a version of the 'Rattower Legend,' the 'Poor Voter's Song,' the once well-known 'Pauper's Drive,' often wrongly attributed to Thomas Hood, and pretty verses on the scenery of the Thames. Noel lived for many years in great seclusion at Boyne Hill, near Maidenhead; but in the autumn of 1858 he went to live at Brighton, where he died on 16 May 1861. Miss Mitford corresponded with him frequently, although they never met. Among other friends were Thomas Vardon, the librarian of the House of Commons, and Lady Byron, the wife of the poet, who was a distant connection. By his wife Emily, youngest daughter of Captain Halliday of Ham Lodge, Twickenham, Noel left two children.
The 'Pauper's Drive' and 'A Thames Voyage' are quoted in extenso and justly praised by Miss Mitford in her 'Recollections of a Literary Life.' The former was set to music by Mr. Henry Russell in 1839. Noel also wrote the words of the familiar song 'Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep.'
[Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1715-1886; James Payn's Literary Recollections, pp. 87-92; Miss Mitford's Recollections of a Literary Life, 1 859, p.29; Gent. Mag 1854,i.215; Daily Telegraph, 30 June 1894; Notes and Queries, 1st ser. x. 285, 350, 453, 7th ser. xii. 486, 8th ser. i. 153, vi. 52, 150; private information.]
T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Noel, Gerard Thomas

​NOEL, GERARD THOMAS (1782–1851), divine, born on 2 Dec. 1782, was second son of Sir Gerard Noel-Noel, bart., and Diana, only child of Charles Middleton, first lord Barham [q. v.], and was elder brother of Baptist Wriothesley Noel [q. v.] Sir Gerard's eldest son Charles was created in 1841 Earl of Gainsborough, and thenceforth the brothers were allowed to bear the courtesy prefix of 'honourable,' as in the case of sons of peers. Gerard was educated at Edinburgh and at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated B.A. in 1805 and M.A. in 1808. On taking holy orders he held successively the curacy of Radwell, Hertfordshire, and the vicarage of Rainham, Essex, and Romsey, Hampshire. He was instituted to the last in 1840. He was also appointed in 1834 to an honorary canonry at Winchester. At Romsey he restored the abbey church. Noel was for many years a close friend of Bishop Samuel Wilberforce [q. v.], who eulogises his character, influence, and worth in a preface to Noel's 'Sermons preached at Romsey.' Noel was twice married, first in 1806 to Charlotte Sophia, daughter of Sir Lucius ​O'Brien, and secondly in 1841 to Susan, daughter of Sir John Kennaway. He died at Romsey on 24 Feb. 1851. His published works were:
* 'A Selection of Psalms and Hymns for Public Worship' (a compilation which includes compositions of his own), 1810.
* 'Arvendel, or Sketches in Italy and Switzerland,' 1813.
* 'Fifty Sermons for the Use of Families,' 1826, 1827.
* 'A Brief Inquiry into the Prospects of the Church of Christ,' 1828.
* 'Fifty Sermons preached at Romsey.' Preface by Bishop S. Wilberforce, 1853.
[Debrett's Genealogical Peerage, 1844, art. Gainsborough, Earl of;' Romilly's Graduati Cantabrigienses, 1856, p. 279; Foster's Index Ecclesiasticus, 1890, p. 130; preface to Sermons preached at Romsey; Julian's Dict. of Hymnology, 1892, p. 809.]
A. R. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dundas, Robert (d.1726)

​DUNDAS, ROBERT, second Lord Arniston (d. 1726), ordinary lord of session, eldest son of Sir James Dundas, lord Arniston [q. v.], by Marion, daughter of Robert, lord Boyd, was educated abroad, but returned to Scotland as an adherent of the Prince of Orange, and represented Midlothian in the parliaments of 1700–2 and 1702–7. He was appointed an ​ordinary lord of session on 1 Nov. 1689, assuming the title of Lord Arniston, and sat on the bench for thirty years. He was fond of retirement and study. Guarini's ‘Pastor Fido’ was among his favourite books. By his wife Margaret, daughter of Sir Robert Sinclair of Stevenson, he had six sons, of whom the second, Robert the elder [q. v.], became lord president of the court of session, and four daughters. Dundas died on 25 Nov. 1726.
J. M. R.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dundas, Robert Saunders

​DUNDAS, ROBERT SAUNDERS, second Viscount Melville (1771–1851), statesman, only son of Henry Dundas, first viscount Melville [q. v.], the friend of Pitt, was born on 14 March 1771. He was educated at the Edinburgh High School, and entered parliament when aged twenty-three, in 1794, as M.P. for Hastings. He received his initiation into political life by acting as private secretary to his father, who was from 1794 ​to 1801 both secretary of state for war and the colonies and president of the board of control for the affairs of India. In 1796 he was elected M.P. for Rye, and in the same year he married an heiress, Anne Saunders, great niece of Admiral Sir Charles Saunders, K.B., whose name he took in addition to his own, and in May 1800 he received his first official appointment as one of the keepers of the signet for Scotland. In 1801 he was elected M.P. for Midlothian, and in 1805 and 1806 he first made his mark in the House of Commons by his speeches in favour of his father when attacked and finally impeached for malversation in his office as treasurer of the navy. In March 1807 he was sworn of the privy council, and in April accepted a seat in the cabinet of the Duke of Portland as president of the board of control, a seat offered him rather on account of his father's great merits as an administrator and services to the tory party than for anything he had himself done. Sir Walter Scott, whom he visited about this time at Ashiestiel, Selkirkshire, says of him to John Murray: ‘Though no literary man he is judicious, clairvoyant, and uncommonly sound-headed, like his father, Lord Melville.’ In 1809 he filled the office of Irish secretary from April to October, but in November returned to his old post of president of the board of control under the Perceval administration. On his father's death, in May 1811, he became second lord Melville. When Lord Liverpool reconstituted the ministry in the following year, Melville was appointed first lord of the admiralty, an office which he held for no less than fifteen years. In this office he showed great administrative talent, kept his department in good order, and took particular interest in Arctic expeditions, an interest which was acknowledged by Melville Sound being called after him. He held many other offices in Scotland, was made lord privy seal there in 1811, appointed a governor of the Bank of Scotland, elected chancellor of the university of St. Andrews in 1814, and made a knight of the Thistle in 1821. After the death of Lord Liverpool, Lord Melville was one of the tory leaders who refused to serve under Canning, and he therefore resigned office; but he was reappointed to the admiralty by the Duke of Wellington in 1828, and occupied it till the fall of the Wellington administration in 1830, when he retired from political life. He took up his residence at Melville Castle, near Edinburgh, where he died at the age of eighty on 10 June 1851, and was succeeded as third viscount by his eldest son, Henry (see Dundas, Henry, third viscount Melville).
H. M. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dundas, William

​DUNDAS, WILLIAM (1762–1845), politician, third son of Robert Dundas (1713–1787) [q. v.], lord president of the court of session in 1760, by Jean, daughter of William Grant, lord Prestongrange, born in 1762, was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn on 31 Jan. 1788. He entered parliament as M.P. for the Crail boroughs in 1794, being elected for the united boroughs of Kirkwall, Wick, Dornoch, Dingwall, and Tain in 1796, for which he was re-elected in the following year on taking office as one of the commissioners on the affairs of India (board of control), of which his uncle, Henry Dundas, afterwards Viscount Melville [q. v.], was then president. He sat on the board until 1803. He was sworn of the privy council in 1800. In 1802 and 1806 he was returned to parliament for Sutherland, and in 1810 for Inverary, Elgin, Banff, Cullen, Kirton district of burghs. Between 1804 and 1806 he was secretary-at-war. He was a lord of the admiralty from 1812 to 1814. On 26 March 1812 he succeeded Sir Patrick Murray, who had accepted the stewardship of the Chiltern Hundreds, as M.P. for the city of Edinburgh, which he continued to represent until 1831, when he retired from parliamentary life. On 10 Aug. 1814 he was appointed keeper of the signet, and in 1821 lord clerk register. He was also made clerk of the sasines in 1819. He died at St. Leonards-on-Sea on 14 Nov. 1845, in receipt of an official income of nearly 4,000l. Dundas married Mary, daughter of the Hon. James Stuart Wortley Mackenzie.
J. M. R.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dunham, Samuel Astley

​DUNHAM, SAMUEL ASTLEY, LL.D. (d. 1858), historian, was author of works published in Lardner's ‘Cabinet Cyclopædia.’ All were distinguished by original research and conscientious thoroughness. He wrote: 1. ‘The History of Poland,’ 1831. 2. ‘History of Spain and Portugal,’ 5 vols., 1832–3. This is still accounted the best work on the subject in any language. It obtained for him the distinction of being made a member of the Royal Spanish Academy; and it was translated into Spanish by Alcala Galiano in 1844. 3. ‘A History of Europe during the Middle Ages,’ 4 vols., 1833–4. 4. ‘Lives of the Most Eminent Literary and Scientific Men of Great Britain,’ 3 vols., 1836–7. These volumes include dramatists and early writers, and were not wholly written by Dunham. 5. ‘History of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway,’ 3 vols., 1839–40. 6. ‘History of the Germanic Empire,’ 3 vols., 1844–5. After this time he was largely occupied with the reviewing of books, and, in his latest years, with biblical work, much of which has never seen the light. He is stated to have had a long and intimate acquaintance with Spain, presumably prior to the writing of his history. He was intimate with Southey, who spoke of his knowledge of the middle ages as marvellous, and he was in close correspondence with Lingard, the historian, who was godfather to one of his sons. His death took place suddenly by paralysis on 17 July 1858. One of his sons is a missionary priest, at present (1888) labouring in the Australian bush.
C. W. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dunglisson, Robley

​DUNGLISSON, ROBLEY, M.D. (1798–1869), medical writer, son of William Dunglisson, was born at Keswick, Cumberland, 4 Jan. 1798, and in accordance with a custom of the north-west of England, received in baptism his mother's maiden name. He was apprenticed to an apothecary at Keswick, attended lectures at Edinburgh and in London, and in 1819 became a surgeon-apothecary, to which diplomas in 1824 he added an Erlangen doctorate, as a preliminary to commencing practice as a man midwife. He published in 1824 ‘Commentaries on Diseases of the Stomach and Bowels of Children,’ a lengthy compilation which excited the admiration of an agent of the university of Virginia, then seeking professors in Europe, and led to Dunglisson's appointment as a professor. He reached America in 1825, and lectured for nine years in the university of Virginia. During this period he published a ‘Human Physiology’ in two volumes, and a medical dictionary. In 1833 he migrated to the university of Maryland, and lectured at Baltimore on materia medica, therapeutics, hygiene, and medical jurisprudence, and at the same time wrote treatises on general therapeutics and on hygiene. He was elected professor of the institutes of medicine in Jefferson Medical College, moved to Philadelphia in 1836, and there lectured till 1868. He wrote magazine articles on a great variety of subjects, translated and edited many medical books, and wrote a ‘Practice of Medicine,’ 1842, and a ‘History of Medicine’ (edited since his death by his son, 1872). A complete list of his medical writings is printed in the ‘Index Catalogue of the Library of the Surgeon-General's Office, U.S. Army’ (iii. 949–950). They show extensive superficial acquaintance with books, but no thorough reading in medicine, while his knowledge of disease from personal observation seems to have been small. He could write down in a morning enough to fill fifteen pages of print, but his reputation for learning in America was due to the want of learning in the universities in which he flourished. He was a most industrious professor, and excited the admiration of his pupils and of the American medical world, which bought 125,000 copies of his works. He was the most voluminous writer of his day in the new world, and his American biographer records with pride that in point of bulk the works of all his American contemporaries sink into insignificance beside his. He married in London in 1824 Harriette Leadam, and had seven children. He died of disease of the aortic valves, 1 April 1869, and at the post-mortem examination his brain was found to be five ounces heavier than the average English male brain.
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Caswall, Edward

​CASWALL, EDWARD (1814–1878), divine and poet, was son of the Rev. Robert Clarke Caswall, and younger brother of Dr. Henry Caswall, prebendary of Salisbury. He was born on 15 July 1814 at Yateley, Hampshire, where his father was vicar. He was educated at Marlborough and at Brasenose College, Oxford, of which society he was Hulme exhibitioner. He graduated B.A. in 1836 and M.A. in 1838. After ordination he was presented to the perpetual curacy of Stratford-sub-Castle, Wiltshire, in the diocese of his uncle, Dr. Burgess, bishop of Salisbury [q. v.] This living he resigned shortly before his reception into the Roman catholic church in January 1847. Two years later he became a widower, and in March 1850 he joined the Oratory of St. Philip Neri, under Dr. (afterwards Cardinal) Newman, whose acquaintance he had made at the house of Lord Shrewsbury, and to whose writings he always attributed his conversion to the catholic faith. In one of his numerous lyrics, beginning, ‘Hail, sacred Force! hail Energy sublime!’ Caswall bore eloquent tribute to the influence exercised over him by Dr. Newman's magic pen. While at Oxford ​ Caswall had given evidence of considerable humour and literary skill in two pamphlets by ‘Scriblerus Redivivus’ entitled ‘Pluck Examination Papers’ (1836) and ‘A new Art, teaching how to be plucked, being a treatise after the fashion of Aristotle’ (1837); and before his secession from the established church he published a collection of thoughtful ‘Sermons on the Seen and Unseen’ (London, 1846, 8vo). Afterwards he acquired distinction as a sacred poet, and some of his hymns, original and translated, are known wherever the English language is spoken. He died at the Oratory, Edgbaston, near Birmingham, on 2 Jan. 1878, and was buried at Rednall, near Bromsgrove, in the private cemetery belonging to the Birmingham Oratory.
He published several devotional works, translated for the most part from the French, and was also the author of: 1. ‘Lyra Catholica, containing all the Breviary and Missal Hymns; with others from various sources,’ translated, London, 1849, 1884, 32mo; New York, 1851, 12mo. 2. ‘The Masque of Mary, and other poems,’ London, 1858, 8vo. 3. ‘A May Pageant, and other poems,’ London, 1865, 16mo.
[Birmingham Daily Post, 4 Jan. 1878; Guardian, 9 Jan. 1878, p. 41; Weekly Register, 19 Jan. 1878, p. 38, columns 1 and 3; Cat. of Oxford Graduates (1851), 117; Preface to Shipley's Annus Sanctus; Gillow's Bibl. Dict. i. 429; Postscript to Gondon's Conversion de 500 Ministres Anglicains; Gondon's Les récentes Conversions de l'Angleterre, 227; Browne's Annals of the Tractarian Movement, 145; Cat. of Printed Books in Brit. Mus.]
T. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Castle, Richard

Also Richard Cassel, and Richard Cassels
​CASTLE, CASSEL, or CASSELS, RICHARD (d. 1751), architect, was a German, who at the invitation of Sir Gustavus Hume, bart., settled in Ireland in the second decade of the last century. He had few rivals, and soon obtained an extensive practice. He began with rebuilding his patron's seat, Castle Hume, co. Fermanagh; he afterwards designed the mansion of Hazlewood, co. Sligo; Powerscourt, co. Wicklow; Carton House, co. Kildare; and Bessborough House, co. Kilkenny. In Dublin his designs included the Marquis of Waterford's house in Marlborough Street, Leinster House in Kildare Street, afterwards the Dublin Society house, Lord Bective's house in Smithfield, and many private houses in Sackville Street, Stephen's Green, and other parts of the city. His public works were not so numerous. He built the cupola of the old chapel in the college, long since removed; the printing-office in the college park; the Rotunda, or lying-in hospital; and the music hall in Fishamble Street, where Handel produced the ‘Messiah’ on 18 April 1742, and praised the building for its acoustic properties. The design for the Parliament House is believed to be his. Castle died suddenly at Carton on 19 Feb. 1751, aged about sixty, and was buried at Maynooth (Webb, Compendium of Irish Biography, p. 582). He is represented as a man of integrity, of amiable though somewhat eccentric manners, whom convivial habits kept poor. It is said that when he felt dissatisfied with any part of his work, he collected his men together, marched them to it in procession, and forthwith pulled it down. To Castle belongs the credit of having introduced into Ireland a greatly improved style of architecture. In 1736 he published ​ ‘An Essay towards Supplying the City of Dublin with Water.’
[Warburton, Whitelaw, and Walsh's Hist. of Dublin, ii. 1187–8; Redgrave's Dict. of Artists, 1878.]
G. G.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Catcher, Edward

​CATCHER or Burton, EDWARD (1584?–1624?), jesuit, son of Edward Catcher of London, was born in 1584 or 1586, and studied at Balliol College, Oxford, where he took the degree of B.A. He was reconciled to the catholic church in 1606, entered the English college at Rome the same year, completed his studies at Valladolid, joined the Society of Jesus at Louvain in 1609 or 1611, was procurator of the order at Liège 1621–1623, and died on the English mission about 1624. He translated into English Father Véron's sermons preached before the Duke de Longueville, and his ‘Defeat of Henshe, the Calvinistic Minister,’ printed at Douay 1616.
[Foley's Records, i. 149, vi. 240, 523, vii. 123; Southwell's Bibl. Script. Soc. Jesu, 184; Oliver's Jesuit Collections, 63; Backer's Bibl. des Écrivains de la Compagnie de Jésus (1869), 966.]
T. C.