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

​NASMITH, DAVID (1799–1839), originator of town and city missions, born at Glasgow on 21 March 1799, was sent to the city grammar school with a view to the university, but, as he made no progress, he was apprenticed about 1811 to a manufacturer there. In June 1813 he became secretary to the newly established Glasgow Youths' Bible Association, and devoted all his leisure to religious work in Glasgow. From 1821 until 1828 he acted as assistant secretary to twenty-three religious and charitable societies connected with the Institution Rooms in Glassford Street. Chiefly through his exertions the Glasgow City Mission was founded on 1 Jan. 1826. He afterwards proceeded to Dublin in order to establish a similar institution there. He also formed the Local Missionary Society for Ireland, in connection with which he visited various places in the country. In July 1830 he sailed from Greenock to New York and visited between forty and fifty towns in the United States and Canada, forming in all thirty-one missions and various benevolent associations. In June 1832 he went to France, and founded missions at Paris and Havre. In 1835 he accepted the secretaryship of the Continental Society in London. There he organised the London City Mission, with the assistance of Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton [q. v.], as treasurer, the Philanthropic Institution House, the Young Men's Society, the Adult School Society, the Metropolitan Monthly Tract Society, and finally the London Female Mission. In March 1837 he resigned his office as gratuitous secretary of the London City Mission, and with a few friends he formed, ​on 16 March, the British and Foreign Mission, for the purposes of corresponding with the city and town missions already in existence and of planting new ones. While prosecuting this work Nasmith died at Guildford, Surrey, on 17 Nov. 1839 (Gent. Mag. 1839, pt. ii. p. 665), and was buried on the 25th in Bunhill Fields. He died poor, and 2,420l. was collected by subscription and invested on behalf of his widow and five children. In March 1828 he had married Frances, daughter of Francis Hartridge, of East Farleigh, Kent. There is a portrait of him by J. C. Armytage.
G. G.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mills, John (d.1784?)

​MILLS, JOHN (d. 1784?), writer on agriculture, was in Paris in 1743 for the purpose of bringing out, in concert with Sellius, a German historian, a French edition of Ephraim Chambers's ‘Cyclopædia;’ but Lebreton, the printer commissioned by him to manage the undertaking, cheated him out of the subscription money, assaulted him, and ultimately obtained a license in his own name. This was the origin of the famous ‘Encyclopédie.’ Mills, unable to obtain redress, returned to England, and Sellius died at Charenton Lunatic Asylum in 1787. In 1763 Mills continued, completed, and dedicated to the Earl of Bute ‘Memoirs of the Court of Augustus,’ by Thomas Blackwell the younger [q. v.] Finding his true vocation as a writer on agriculture, he translated in 1762 Duhamel du Monceau's ‘Practical Treatise of Husbandry.’ In 1766 he published an ‘Essay on the Management of Bees;’ in 1770 a translation from the Latin of G. A. Gyllenberg's ‘Natural and Chemical Elements of Agriculture;’ in 1772 an ‘Essay on the Weather’ (translated into Dutch in 1772), and ‘Essays, Moral, Philosophical, and Political’ (anonymous, but advertised under his name); and in 1776 a ‘Treatise on Cattle.’ His chief work, ‘A New System of Practical Husbandry,’ in 5 vols., appeared in 1767. It was the earliest complete treatise on all branches of agriculture, and contains the first mention of the potato as grown in fields. It combines the results of the experience and observations of such writers as Evelyn, Duhamel, John Worlidge, and Jethro Tull, and is highly commended by Donaldson, who gives an abstract ​of its contents. Mills was a warm advocate of small farms. In 1766 he was elected a F.R.S., and he was the first foreign associate of the French Agricultural Society, on whose list his name, with London as his residence, appears from 1767 to 1784, in which year he probably died. One John Mills died at Glanton, Northumberland, 8 Nov. 1786 (Gent. Mag. 1786, pt. ii. p. 1002).
[J. Donaldson's Agricultural Biography, 1854, p. 51 *; Mémoires Secrets de la République de Lettres, v. 340; Brit. Mus. Cat.]
J. G. A.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mills, Charles

​MILLS, CHARLES (1788–1826), historical writer, born on 29 July 1788 at Croom's Hill, Greenwich, was youngest son of Samuel Gillam Mills, surgeon. He was educated privately, and, after a brief experience in a merchant's counting-house, was articled in 1804 to a firm of solicitors. In 1810 he placed himself for a year's study in conveyancing under James Humphreys. From boyhood he had always been a hard reader, and he now permanently injured his health by studying through the night. An attack of lung disease compelled him to winter in Nice in 1814–15. He had no liking for the law, and, on inheriting a moderate fortune, abandoned it for literature. Neglecting the directions of his doctors, he died of a recurrence of his old complaint at Southampton on 9 Oct. 1826. He was a bachelor. A few months before his death he was elected one of the knights of Malta, in recognition of his allusions to that fraternity in his ‘History of the Crusades.’
Mills was a man of learning, but as an historian was a very humble follower of Gibbon. His first work, ‘An History of Muhammedanism,’ 8vo, London, 1817 (2nd edit. 1818), had been accidentally seen in manuscript by Sir John Malcolm [q. v.], who not only warmly recommended its publication, but aided in the revision by the loan of many valuable Oriental treatises from his own library. It was translated into French by G. Buisson, 8vo, Guernsey, 1826. His next book ‘The History of the Crusades,’ 2 vols. 8vo, London, 1820 (4th edit. 1828), bears fewer traces of the influence of Gibbon, and was praised by Sir Walter Scott, who assisted him with notes from the Scottish chronicles (letter of Scott to Mills in Book Circular of William Downing of Birmingham, No. 254, p. 9). An ambitious imitation of the ‘Travels of Anacharsis’ entitled ‘The Travels of Theodore Ducas of Candia in Various Countries in Europe at the Revival of Letters and Art,’ 2 vols. 8vo, London, 1822, followed. It proved unsuccessful, and only the first part, comprising ‘Italy,’ appeared. A design of writing a history of Rome came to nothing. Mills soon afterwards became absorbed in his last and most popular book, ‘The History of Chivalry, or Knighthood and its Times,’ 2 vols. 8vo, London, 1825 (2nd edit. 1826). Scott was delighted with it, and, through the medium of Constable, sent the author a letter full of generous praise. Mills's collective works were translated into French by P. Tiby (7 vols. 8vo, Paris, 1825).
A bust of Mills was executed about 1824 by Sievier, from which a portrait was engraved.
[Memoir (by A. Skottowe), 1828; Gent. Mag. 1826 pt. ii. pp. 559–60.]
G. G.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mills, George (1808-1881)

​MILLS, GEORGE (1808–1881), ship-builder, journalist, and novelist, born in 1808, was son of William Mills, lord provost of Glasgow 1833–6. He was educated at the university of Glasgow, and from 1827 to 1833 was manager for the company then started by his father to run steamers from Leith to London. From 1835, in partnership with Charles Wood, he carried on the business of ship​building at Bowling-on-the-Clyde, under the style of Wood & Mills. In 1838 the firm, the first, it is said, on the Clyde, began building iron steamers; they built also a large number of iron canal boats, many of which are still (1894) existent. In 1844, in consequence of the depression in the trade, Mills withdrew from the concern, and from 1845 to 1850 was a stockbroker; he was at the same time manager of the Bowling and Balloch Railway and of the Loch Lomond Steamboat Company. In 1857 he started the ‘Glasgow Advertiser and Shipping Gazette,’ a weekly penny paper, the first penny paper published in Glasgow. When in the following year the daily papers reduced their price to a penny, the ‘Gazette’ was beaten out of the field. After that Mills designed and had built, by Messrs. Tod & McGregor, a double-bodied steamer with central wheel, named the Alliance. She was the first steamer on the Clyde which had a saloon on deck, but she had not sufficient speed. She was sold, and afterwards, it is said, proved very successful as a blockade-runner, a service for which, with her slow speed and small carrying capacity, she does not seem to have been well adapted. She was lost in or about 1867. In 1869 Mills started a halfpenny paper, called ‘The Northern Star,’ in Aberdeen. It was given up in 1871. He was also for many years the literary critic of the ‘Glasgow Mail.’ In 1866 he started the Milton Chemical Works, which he carried on till his death. He was also the author of ‘Craigclutha: a Tale of Old Glasgow and the West of Scotland,’ 1857, ‘I remember,’ 1858, and ‘The Beggar's Benison, or a Hero without a Name, but with an Aim: a Clydesdale Story,’ 1866, 2 vols. post 8vo. They were all published anonymously; only the last is in the British Museum. Mills died at Glasgow in May 1881. He was married, and left issue one son.
[Information from the family.]
J. K. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mills, John (1812-1873)

​MILLS, JOHN (1812–1873), author and Calvinistic methodist minister, born 19 Dec. 1812 at Llanidloes, Montgomeryshire, was son of Edward Mills, by his wife Mary. Devoting himself to music, he travelled through the country, establishing musical societies in various places, and thus greatly extended musical culture in Wales. In 1846 he went to London to act as a missionary to the Jews on behalf of the Welsh Calvinistic methodists. In 1855 and 1859 he visited the Holy Land in order to better equip himself for this work. He was a member of many learned societies connected with biblical and oriental studies. He died in London, 28 July 1873.
His chief works are: 1. ‘Grammadeg Cerddoriaeth,’ a grammar of music (Llanidloes, 1838), the first complete musical handbook published in the Welsh language. 2. ‘British Jews,’ London, 1853. 3. ‘Palestina,’ in Welsh only, Llanidloes, 1858. 4. ‘Three Months' Residence in Nablûs, and an Account of the Modern Samaritans,’ London, 1864.
[Biography of the Rev. John Mills, by Mr. Richard Mills and the Rev. N. C. Jones, D.D. (in Welsh), Aberdare, 1881.]
J. A. J.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mills, Richard

​MILLS, RICHARD (1809–1844), Welsh musician, was the son of Henry Mills, and was born at Ty Newydd, Llanidloes, in March 1809. He showed musical talent at an early age, and competed successfully at eisteddfodau upon musical and literary subjects. In 1838 he published some of his literary compositions; better known, however, are his musical publications, ‘Caniadau Seion’ (1840), a collection of congregational tunes, and ‘Yr Arweinydd Cerddorol,’ published in three parts (1840–5), and consisting chiefly of musical instruction. Richard Mills and his nephews, John and Richard, who carried on his work, did much to improve the character of Welsh ecclesiastical music, and to popularise musical knowledge in Wales. They were the pioneers of the modern musical movement in that country. Mills died on 24 Dec. 1844. His brother James (d. 1844) was also a musician of talent.
[Montgomeryshire Worthies in Montgomeryshire Collections, xv. 49.]
J. E. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mills, Alfred

​MILLS, ALFRED (1776–1833), draughtsman, was a skilful designer of illustrations to small books of juvenile instruction, such as ‘Pictures of Roman History in Miniature,’ 1809, ‘Pictures of English History,’ 1811, ‘Portraits of the Sovereigns of England,’ 1817. He worked in this line for about forty years. He also frequently drew designs on blocks for the leading wood-engravers. In ​1807 he exhibited three figure-drawings at the Royal Academy. After an industrious life he died at Walworth on 7 Dec. 1833, aged 57, leaving a wife and six children.
[Gent. Mag. 1834, pt. i. p. 116; Brit. Mus. Cat.]
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mills, George (1792?-1824)

​MILLS, GEORGE (1792?–1824), medallist, was born in 1792 or before 28 Jan. 1793. He gained three gold medals from the Society of Arts, and exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1816 to 1823 (Redgrave, Dict. of Artists). His first patron was Benjamin West, P.R.A., who pronounced him the first medallist in England, and to whose memory Mills dedicated a portrait-medal. He was never employed at the Royal Mint, but engraved for James Mudie a silver pattern-crown of George III (Crowther, Engl. Pattern Coins, p. 38), and a pattern-crown (in gold and silver) of George IV, published by Whiteave (ib. p. 41). These patterns show little decorative taste, but he obtained three gold medals from the Society of Arts, presented as the reward of merit. Among Mills's medals which display moderate ability the following may be mentioned: 1. Admiral Sir J. T. Duckworth [1817?] (Num. Chron. 1890, p. 96, pl. iv. 15). 2. James Watt, rev. Watt's steam-engine [1819?] (Cochran-Patrick, Catal. of Scott. Medals, p. 117; pl. xxiv. 2). 3. Benjamin West [1820?] (Wroth, English Personal Medals, p. 21). 4. Medals for J. Mudie's series of ‘National Medals’ issued about 1820, including battle of Talavera (Grueber, Brit. Mus. Guide to Engl. Medals, No. 545), Sir John Moore, Lord Hill, Sir Thomas Picton, and Lord Lynedoch (ib. Nos. 554–7). 5. Visit of George IV to Ireland [1821], (reverse only; obv. by B. Wyon). 6. Medal of the Astronomical Society, first awarded in 1822, obv. bust of Newton, rev. Herschel's telescope (Hawkins, Med. Illustr. ii. 472, No. 88). 7. Lismore School medal (W. Frazer, Medallists of Ireland). Mills died at Birmingham on 28 Jan. 1824, aged 31 (Gent. Mag. 1824, pt. i. p. 186). His works are usually signed mills, sometimes g. mills.
[Authorities cited above.]
W. W.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Millyng, Thomas

​MILLYNG, THOMAS (d. 1492), bishop of Hereford, became about 1447, when quite a youth, a monk at Westminster, and thence proceeded to the Benedictine College, Gloucester Hall (now Worcester College), Oxford, where he remained till he graduated D.D. He then returned to Westminster, and in 1465 succeeded the chronicler John Flete [q. v.] as prior. The abbot George Norwych had wasted the revenues and incurred large debts, and he was now forced to retire to another Benedictine house, with an annual pension of a hundred marks. Although he retained the nominal title of abbot, Millyng, aided by two senior monks, one of whom, John Esteney, was afterwards (1474) abbot, governed the house, and on Norwych's death in 1469 was ‘unanimously’ elected in his place. The wars of the roses were then raging, and when in October 1470 Edward IV fled abroad, his queen, Elizabeth Woodville [q. v.], took sanctuary at Westminster. The abbot received her in his lodgings, where her elder son, afterwards Edward V [q. v.], was born on 2 or 3 Nov., and christened without pomp by the sub-prior on 4 Nov., the abbot and prior (Esteney) standing godfathers. The royal family remained in sanctuary, receiving ‘half a loafe and two muttons daily’ from the abbot till Edward's return in April 1471. The king rewarded Millyng by making him a privy councillor, and three years later advanced him to the bishopric of Hereford, to which see he was consecrated in the lady chapel at Westminster 21 Aug. 1474. The temporalities were restored on 15 Aug. Millyng died at Hereford before 11 March 1492, and was buried in the centre of St. John the Baptist's Chapel; the stone coffin, with the Hereford badge (a cross fleury), resting on Fascet's tomb, is most probably his. It was removed to make room in the vaults for other interments in the seventeenth century. Millyng was noted for his learning, especially for his knowledge of Greek, a rare accomplishment for monks in those days. He was also a good preacher. Leland (De Script. Brit. p. 483) speaks of his works, but had never seen any, and none are known to be extant.
E. T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Milman, Francis

​MILMAN, Sir FRANCIS, M.D. (1746–1821), physician, was born on 31 Aug. 1746 at East Ogwell, Devonshire. His father, Francis Milman, was rector of that parish, and vicar of Abbots Kerswell, in the same county. On 30 June 1760 he matriculated at Exeter College, Oxford, whence he graduated B.A. 9 May 1764, M.A. 14 Jan. 1767, M.B. 7 July 1770, M.D. 23 Nov. 1776. In 1765 he was elected to a college fellowship, and in May 1771 a Radcliffe travelling fellow. He was elected physician to the Middlesex Hospital (1777–1779), and a fellow of the College of Physicians of London 30 Sept. 1778. He had made the acquaintance of the Duke of Gloucester at Rome, and by his influence obtained practice in London. In 1785 he was made physician extraordinary to the king's household, and in 1806 became physician in ordinary to the king. At the College of Physicians he delivered the Gulstonian lectures on scurvy in 1780, was five times censor between 1779 and 1799, delivered the Croonian lectures in 1781, and the Harveian oration, which was not printed, in 1782. He was elected president in 1811 and 1812, and resigned 6 Oct. 1813. In 1800 he was created a baronet. His published works are only two, and appeared respectively in 1782 and 1799. The former, ‘Animadversiones de Natura Hydropis ejusque curatione,' is dedicated to the Radcliffe trustees, and is in part based upon observations made during his travels abroad. It never rises above the level of a moderately good graduation thesis, and shows that its author did not distinguish between dropsies due to cirrhosis of the liver, to malignant growth of the peritoneum, and to renal disease. He recommends purgatives and tonics, and thinks that the patient's fluid food need not be restricted. His other book, ‘An Enquiry into the Source from whence the Symptoms of the Scurvy and of Putrid Fevers arise,’ is dedicated to Lord Southampton, and is a compilation showing little practical acquaintance with the disease. He agrees in general with James Lind [q. v.], whom he quotes, and almost the only original passage in the 230 octavo pages is one in which he comments on a passage of Strabo, bk. xvi., and shows that the disease from which the army of Ælius Gallus suffered in Arabia in the reign of Augustus was a form of scurvy. He died at Pinner Grove, Middlesex, 24 June 1821, and was buried in the church of St. Luke at Chelsea. He was a courtly person, of no great medical attainments.
Milman married, 20 July 1779, Frances, daughter of William Hart of Stapleton, Gloucestershire. His eldest son, William George, succeeded him in the baronetcy, and was father of Robert Milman [q. v.]; his youngest son, Henry Hart Milman [q. v.], was dean of St. Paul's.
[Works; Munk's Coll. of Phys. ii. 316; Gent. Mag. 1821; Annual Reg. 1821; Foster's Alumni Oxon.; Boase's Reg. Coll. Exon. xxiv. 107; information from Dr. J. B. Nias.]
N. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Holmes, George (1662-1749)

​HOLMES, GEORGE (1662–1749), archivist, born at Skipton in Craven, Yorkshire, in 1662, became about 1695 clerk to Sir William Petyt, keeper of the records in the Tower of London, and for nearly sixty years acted as deputy to Petyt, and his successors Topham and Polhill. He was also barrack-master at the Tower, a fellow of the Royal Society, an early fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and a member of the Gentlemen's Society at Spalding. Browne Willis, Dr. Tovey, Dr. William Richardson, and other antiquaries gratefully acknowledged his assistance. From October 1707 until his death he was employed, on the nomination of Lord Halifax, chairman of committees in the House of Commons, to arrange the records deposited in the Tower at a salary of 200l. He died 16 Feb. 1748–9. He married the daughter of a sword-cutler in Fleet Street named Marshall. An only son, George, received his education at Eton, and was clerk under his father, but died at the age of twenty-five, many years before him. Mrs. Holmes, who survived her husband, received 200l. from the government and 200l. for her husband's manuscripts relating to the public records, which were deposited among the official documents at the Tower.
Holmes prepared the first seventeen volumes of the second edition of Rymer's ‘Fœdera,’ 20 vols., Lond., 1727–35, fol. He collated the documents with the originals in the Tower, and supplied many paragraphs and lines omitted in the former edition. Before this republication a set of the seventeen volumes was sold for a hundred guineas. The last three volumes are the same for both editions. The seventeenth volume of the second edition contains a general index to all the preceding volumes.
When Peter Le Neve, president of the Society of Antiquaries, proposed, in January 1721–2, to collect accounts of all the ancient coins relative to Great Britain, Holmes undertook to describe the Saxon coins in the possession of Councillor Hill; but the project was ultimately abandoned.
Holmes's curious collection of books, prints, and coins was sold by auction in 1749. His portrait was engraved by G. Vertue for the Society of Antiquaries, from a painting by R. van Bleeck.
[Nichols's Lit. Anecd. i. 386, 480, iii. 617, iv. 543, v. 353, vii. 184; Nichols's Illustr. of Lit. iv. 150, 441; Lowndes's Bibl. Man. (Bohn), p. 2161; Addit. MSS. 5833 f. 160 b, 5853 pp. 494, 495, 6183 f. 36.]
T. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Holmes, George (fl.1673-1715)

​HOLMES, GEORGE (fl. 1673–1715), organist and composer, perhaps a son of Thomas Holmes and grandson of John Holmes (fl. 1602) [q. v.], was in 1698 organist to the Bishop of Durham, Nathaniel, lord Crewe, formerly dean of the Chapel Royal. From 1704 till about 1715 Holmes was organist to Lincoln Cathedral. He contributed several catches to the ‘Musical Companion’ in 1673. A toccata for single or double organ, believed to be by Holmes, in a book of organ music once in his possession (Addit. MS. 31446), a suite for harpsichord (ib. 31465), and an air or brawle for two trebles and a bass (ib. 31429, No. 34) are preserved ​in the British Museum Library, as well as two anthems in Tudway's ‘Collection’ (Harl. MS. 7341, pp. 233, 453)—‘Arise, shine, O Daughter of Zion,’ 1706, written on the occasion of the union of England and Scotland, and ‘I will love Thee’—and the Funeral Service (Addit. MS. 17820). Other of his anthems are said to be in the choir-books of Lincoln. The music of Holmes's ‘Ode for St. Cecilia's Day’ no longer exists; but among his published music is ‘A Verse on St. Cecilia's Day,’ 1715, in which Bacchus is said to grace the occasion. The songs ‘Tell me, little wanton boy,’ ‘Celia's invitation,’ ‘The Resolution,’ and ‘The Man loves best,’ are also ascribed to Holmes.
[Wood's MS. Lives of Musicians; Husk's Celebrations, p. 53; Grove's Dict. of Music, i. 744; Mr. Julian Marshall's memorandum in above-mentioned organ-book.]
L. M. M.