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

​MULLER, JOHN (1699–1784), mathematician, was born in Germany in 1699. His first book, a treatise on conic sections, published in London in 1736, is dated from the Tower of London, and dedicated to the master-general of the ordnance, the Duke of Argyll and Greenwich, although Muller's name does not appear in the ordnance-lists in 'Angliæ Notitiæ' at this period. In 1741 Muller was appointed head-master of the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, at a salary of 200l. a year, by the new master-general [see Montagu, John, second Duke of Montagu]. At first, the academy was a mere school, where the masters, Muller and Thomas Simpson, resented military interference, and the boys defied the masters at will (see Duncan, Hist. Roy. Artillery, vol. i.) Subsequently, matters improved, the cadet-company was formed, the academy enlarged, and Muller appointed professor of fortification and artillery, a post he held until superannuated and pensioned in September 1766 (Records Roy. Mil. Academy). He was 'the scholastic father of all the great engineers this country employed for forty years' (Hill, Boswell, i. 351). He died in April 1784, at the age of eighty-five. A portrait of Muller, painted by J. Hay, was engraved by T. Major (Bromley). His library was sold in 1785 (Nichol, Lit. Anecd. vol. iii.)
Muller published:
* 'A Mathematical Treatise, containing a System of Conic Sections and the Doctrine of Fluxions and Fluents applied to Various Subjects,' London, 1736, 4to.
* 'The Attack and Defence of Fortified Places,' London, 1747.
* 'A Treatise containing the Practical Part of Fortification, for the Use of the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich,' London, 1755, 4to.
* 'A Treatise on Fortification, Regular and Irregular. With Remarks on the Constructions of Vauban and Coehorn,' London, 1756, 4to, 2nd edit.
* 'The Field Engineer. Translated from the French of De Clairac, London, 1759, 8vo.
* 'Treatise on Artillery,' a compendious work, London, 1757; with Supplement, London, 1768.
* 'New System of Mathematics, to which is prefaced an Account of the First Principles of Algebra,' London, 1769, 8vo; another edit. London, 1771.
[Muller's writings; Watt's Bibl. Brit.; Gent. Mag. 1784, i. 475.]
H. M. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mulvany, Charles Pelham

​MULVANY, CHARLES PELHAM (1835–1885), minor poet and journalist, son of Henry William Mulvany, barrister-at-law, and grandson of a captain in the royal navy who took part in the battle of Bunker Hill (17 June 1775), was born in Dublin on 20 May 1835. He entered Trinity College, Dublin, in 1850, became a scholar in 1854, and graduated B.A. at Dublin University as first-honour man in classics in June 1856. Before this date he had written verse in ‘The Nation’ over the signature ‘C. P. M. Sch.;’ he was editor of the ‘College Magazine’ during 1856 and 1857, and also wrote for the ‘Irish Metropolitan Magazine,’ 1857–8.
After a few years of service as a surgeon in the British navy Mulvany was ordained deacon of the church of England in 1868, migrated to Canada, and was ordained priest by the Bishop of Ontario in 1872. After acting for about two years as assistant professor of classics at Lenoxville, where he conducted the ‘Students' Monthly,’ he served as curate successively at Clarke's Mills, Huntley, Milford, and the Carrying Place, all in the province of Ontario. He became a constant contributor to Canadian newspapers and magazines, devoting the greater part of his later life to literary work. He kept up his connection with Trinity College by his brilliant contributions to the first three volumes of ‘Kottabos,’ issued respectively in 1874, 1877, and 1881. His latest verses, entitled ‘Our Boys in the North-West Away,’ appeared in the daily ‘Globe,’ Toronto, as late as 25 May 1885. He died at 69 Augusta Terrace, Toronto, on 31 May 1885.
Mulvany's clever verses are essentially of the imitative order. His versatility and effective use of pathos frequently suggest Hood, and he has been spoken of as an Hibernian Calverley; but neither his originality nor his rhyming power quite justifies the title. Many of his happiest parodies have not been published. These deal with local academic incidents, and are still σποράδην ἀειδόμενα in Trinity College.
His chief separate works are:
* 'Lyrics of History and Life,' 1880.
* 'Toronto, Past and Present,' 1884.
* 'History of the North- West Rebellion of 1885.'
All these were published at Toronto. At the time of his death he was preparing a 'History of Liberalism in Canada.'
[O'Donoghue's Poets of Ireland, p. 171; Cat. of Dublin Graduates; Appleton's Cyclopædia of American Biog. iv. 458; The Globe, Toronto, 1 June 1885; The Dominion Annual Register and Review for 1885, Toronto, 1886.]
T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mullens, Joseph

​MULLENS, JOSEPH (1820–1879), missionary, born in London on 2 Sept. 1820, entered Coward College in 1837, and in 1841 graduated B.A. at the London University. In June 1842 he offered himself to the London Missionary Society (congregationalist) for service in India, and after spending one session at Edinburgh in study of mental philosophy and logic, he was ordained to the congregationalist ministry 5 Sept. at Barbican Chapel, and sailed for India in the company of the Rev. A. F. Lacroix [q. v.] Arriving in Calcutta, he entered on his work at Bhowanipore, where he married Lacroix's daughter in 1845. In 1846 he succeeded to the pastorate of the native church at the same place. He remained there twelve years. During this period he prepared a series of statistics of missions in India and Ceylon.
In 1858 he returned to England, and in 1860 took a prominent part in the missionary conference in Liverpool. In 1861 he received from William College, Massachusetts, ​the degree of D.D., and in the same year his wife died. In 1865 Mullens became joint foreign secretary of the London Missionary Society, and in 1868 sole foreign secretary. In the earlier capacity he visited the missionary stations of the society in India and China, returning to England in 1866. In 1867 he received from the university of Edinburgh the degree of D.D. In 1870 he attended the annual meeting of the American Board of Foreign Missions, and remained to advocate the claims of the society in Canada. In 1873 he visited Madagascar to confer with the missionaries there, and he published the results in 'Twelve Months in Madagascar' (1857). After the death of Dr. Thomson of the mission on Lake Tanganyika, Mullens left England, 24 April 1879, with Mr. Griffith and Dr. Southon, to proceed to Zanzibar for the purpose of reinforcing the mission in Central Africa. On arrival at Zanzibar, Mullens resolved to accompany the inexperienced members of the mission to the scene of operation. At Kitange, 5 July, 150 miles from Saadani, Mullens caught a severe cold, and he died on 10 July 1879 at Chakombe, eight miles beyond. He was buried at the mission station of Mpwapwa.
Mullens, by his organising power, mastery of details, and statesmanlike supervision, largely increased the efficiency of the London Missionary Society. In addition to many reports, essays, articles, and notices, he wrote:
* 'Missions in South India visited and described,' 1854.
* 'The Religious Aspects of Hindu Philosophy discussed,' 1860.
* 'Brief Memorials of the Rev. Alphonse Francois Lacroix,' 1862.
* 'A brief Review of Ten Years' Missionary Labour in India, between 1852 and 1861,' London, 1863.
* 'London and Calcutta compared in their Heathenism, their Privileges, and their Prospects,' 1868.
* 'Twelve Months in Madagascar,' 1874; 2nd edit. 1875.
Mrs. Mullens wrote 'Faith and Victory: a Story of the Progress of Christianity in Bengal.'
[The Chronicle of the London Missionary Society, October 1879.]
S. P. O.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mullins, George

​MULLINS, GEORGE (fl. 1760–1775), painter, was a native of Ireland, and studied painting under James Mannin [q. v.] He was employed for some time in a manufactory belonging to Mr. Wise at Waterford, where he painted trays and snuffboxes like those made at Birmingham. He obtained, however, some success as a landscape-painter, and coming to London exhibited at the early exhibitions of the Royal Academy from 1770 to 1775. He married a young woman who kept an alehouse near Temple Bar, called the Horseshoe and Magpye, a place of popular resort. The date of his death is not known.
[Pasquin's Artists of Ireland; Sarsfield Taylor's Fine Arts of Great Britain and Ireland; Redgrave's Dict. of Artists.]
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mulliner, Thomas

​MULLINER, THOMAS (fl. 1550?), musician, was before 1559, according to a manuscript note in Stafford Smith's handwriting, ' master of St. Paul's school,' that is, of the school for the choristers of St. Paul's Cathedral. In 1559 Sebastian Westcott was appointed to the post. If Stafford Smith's note, which is the only evidence of Mulliner's connection with the cathedral, be correct, Mulliner was the master of Tallis and Sheppard, and deserves the credit of maintaining the St. Paul's music-school at a high level of excellence, if not of having raised it to celebrity.
Mulliner made a valuable collection of pieces for the virginals, which is now preserved in Brit. Mus. Addit. MS. 30513. The volume bears an inscription, 'Sum liber Thomas Mullineri, Johanne Heywoode teste.' (Heywood was much employed as a musician about the court.) Most of the music in this collection is written for the virginals, in the hand, it is supposed, of Mulliner; while certain numbers, 'galliardes,' are signed T. M. The manuscript was probably written during the reign of Mary or early in that of Elizabeth; it has been judged by other authorities to belong to Henry VIII's time.
One Thomas Mulliner was scholar of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, in and before 1564, and 'organorum modulator 'on 3 March 1563-4. The name of Mulliner, or Mullyner, was known in the 16th century in Suffolk (Cal. Chanc. Proc. ii. 398), ​Northamptonshire (P. C. C. Registers of wills, Dixy, 29), and Oxfordshire (Registers of wills).
[Foster's Alumni Oxon.; Sparrow Simpson's Gleanings from Old St. Paul's, p. 195; Brit. Mus. Addit. MSS. 30513; and authorities quoted.]
L. M. M.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mulvany, Thomas James

​MULVANY, THOMAS JAMES (d. 1845?), painter and keeper of the Royal Hibernian Academy, first appears as an exhibitor with the Dublin Society of Artists at the rooms of the Dublin Society in Hawkins Street, Dublin, in May 1809. When the Dublin Society in 1819 disposed of their premises and the artists were without a place of exhibition, Mulvany, with his brother, John George Mulvany, who was also a painter, was one of the most strenuous advocates for the grant of a charter of incorporation to the artists of Ireland. When at length this charter was obtained in 1823 and the Royal Hibernian Academy founded under the presidency of Francis Johnston [q. v.], Mulvany and his brother were two of the first fourteen academicians elected. He subsequently became keeper in 1841. During the last years of his life Mulvany was employed in editing 'The Life of James Gandon' [q. v.], which he did not, however, live to complete, as he died about 1845, while the book was not published until 1846. His son, George F. Mulvany (1809–1869), also practised as a painter. He succeeded his father as keeper of the Royal Hibernian Academy, and occasionally sent pictures to the Royal Academy in London. In 1854 he was elected the first director of the newly founded National Gallery of Ireland, and held the post until his death in Dublin on 6 Feb. 1869.
[Sarsfield Taylor's Fine Arts of Great Britain and Ireland; Redgrave's Dict. of Artists.]
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dudley, John (1762-1856)

​DUDLEY, JOHN (1762–1856), miscellaneous writer, eldest son of the Rev. John Dudley, vicar of Humberstone, Leicestershire, was born in 1762. He was first educated at Uppingham school, whence he went to Clare Hall, Cambridge. He proceeded B.A. 1785 (when he was second wrangler and mathematical prizeman), and M.A. 1788. In 1787 he was elected fellow, and in 1788 tutor. In 1794 he succeeded his father in the living of Humberstone. His grandfather had previously held the benefice, which continued in the family for three generations during 142 years. In 1795 he was also presented to the vicarage of Sileby, Leicestershire. According to his own account (advertisement to Naology), Dudley spent ‘a long and happy life’ as ‘a retired student,’ occupying himself chiefly with mythological and philosophical studies. He died at Sileby, 7 Jan. 1856.
Dudley wrote: 1. ‘Sermon preached before the University of Cambridge on the Translation of the Scriptures into the Languages of Indian Asia,’ Cambridge, 1807. 2. ‘The Metamorphosis of Sona, a Hindú Tale,’ in verse, 1810. 3. ‘A Dissertation showing the Identity of the Rivers Niger and Nile,’ 1821. 4. ‘Naology, or a Treatise on the Origin, Progress, and Symbolical Import of the Sacred Structures of the most Eminent Nations and Ages of the World,’ 1846. 5. ‘The Anti-Materialist, denying the Reality of Matter and vindicating the Universality of Spirit,’ 1849. This is a treatise written under the influence of the philosophy of Berkeley, to whose memory it is dedicated.
F. W-t.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dudgeon, William (fl.1765)

​DUDGEON, WILLIAM (fl. 1765), philosophical writer, resided in Berwickshire. He published:
* ‘The State of the Moral World considered; or a Vindication of Providence in the Government of the Moral World,’ 1732, 8vo (an attempt to solve the problem of the existence of evil).
* ‘Philosophical Letters concerning the Being and Attributes of God,’ 1737, 8vo (addressed to the Rev. Mr. Jackson, a follower of Clarke. Dudgeon argues that Clarke's principles involve the conclusion that God is the only substance).
* ‘A Catechism founded upon Experience and Reason. Collected by a Father for the use of his Children,’ with an ‘Introductory Letter to a Friend concerning Natural Religion,’ 1744, 8vo (here natural religion is treated as the common element in all religious systems which alone is true).
A collective edition of the foregoing appeared, under the title of ‘The Philosophical Works of Mr. William Dudgeon,’ in 1765, 8vo.
[Brit. Mus. Cat.]
J. M. R.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dudley, Guildford

​DUDLEY, Lord GUILDFORD (d. 1554), husband of Lady Jane Grey, was the fourth son of the powerful John Dudley [q. v.], duke of Northumberland. When the duke was at the height of his power, in Edward VI's reign, Lord Guildford was his only unmarried son. In July 1552 the duke determined on a match between him and Margaret Clifford, grandniece of Henry VIII and daughter of Henry, first earl of Cumberland [q. v.] Edward VI interested himself in the scheme, and wrote on the subject to both the Duke of Northumberland and the Earl of Cumberland. But the duke's views changed. Margaret Clifford early in 1553 was offered by the duke to his younger brother, Sir Andrew Dudley [see under Dudley, Edmund], and on 21 May (Whitsunday) Lord Guildford was married by his father's direction to Lady Jane Grey, daughter of the Duke of Suffolk [see Dudley, Lady Jane]. This marriage was part of the desperate project of Northumberland for transferring the succession of the crown from the Tudor family to his own. By the instrument which he prevailed on the dying young king to sign (21 June) the crown was to go from both the king's sisters, Mary and Elizabeth, to the heirs male of Frances, duchess of Suffolk, provided that any should be born before the king's death; failing which it was to pass to the Lady Jane Grey, the duchess's daughter, and her heirs male. The Lady Jane, during the brief royalty to which this plot gave rise, though attached to her youthful husband, refused to grant him the title of king, affirming that it lay out of her power (Froude, vi. 16). But in a despatch dated 15 July 1553 Sir Philip Hoby and Sir Richard Moryson, the English envoys at Brussels, gave him the title of king. After the defeat of the enterprise Guildford was committed to the Tower, with his wife; and on 13 Nov. 1553 was led, along with her, his brothers Ambrose and Henry, and Archbishop Cranmer, to the Guildhall, where he was arraigned of treason, and pleaded guilty. The sentence was not carried out until the commotion of Wyatt, in the following spring, had caused fresh alarm. He was then beheaded on Tower Hill 12 Feb., immediately before the execution of the Lady Jane. A portrait, exhibited at the National Portrait Exhibition of 1866, is in the possession of Baron North.
[Nichols's Queen Jane and Queen Mary (Camd. Soc.), pp. 32, 34, 55; Nichols's Literary Remains of Edward VI (Roxburghe Club), clxv, clxviii, cxc; authorities under Dudley, Lady Jane, and notes supplied by the Rev. Canon R. W. Dixon.]
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dudley, Howard

​DUDLEY, HOWARD (1820–1864), wood engraver, was the only son of George Dudley of Tipperary, and Sarah, daughter of Nathaniel Cove, coal merchant, of Salisbury Square, Fleet Street, London. He lost his father at an early age, and removed with his mother to Easebourne, near Midhurst, Sussex. Here he devoted his holiday time to the history and antiquities of the neighbourhood, and when only fourteen years of age determined to illustrate these in print. Setting up a small printing-press of his own he produced in 1835 a small volume entitled ‘Juvenile Researches, or a Description of some of the Principal Towns in the Western Part of Sussex and the Borders of Hants, interspersed with various pieces of Poetry by a Sister, and illustrated by numerous wood-engravings executed by the Author.’ Dudley set the types himself, and without any teaching engraved the numerous illustrations. These, though very rough, show great taste, and are very remarkable for an artist of so tender an age. He printed it one page at a time, and his sister, Miss M. A. Dudley, supplied the poetry. This little volume met with so much success that Dudley was encouraged to reprint it in a slightly enlarged form, and in 1836 to publish another similar volume, entitled ‘The History and Antiquities of Horsham,’ containing thirty woodcuts and four lithographic views, all executed by himself. He made collections for a quarto volume entitled ‘The History and Antiquities of Midhurst,’ to be illustrated with 150 woodcuts and lithographic drawings; but having now adopted the profession of a wood engraver, and obtained sufficient employment, he was unable to carry it out. From 1845 to 1852 he resided and exercised his art in Edinburgh, but eventually ​returned to London, where he died in Holford Square, Pentonville, 4 July 1864, aged 44. He married, in Edinburgh, Jane Ellen, second daughter of Alexander Young, but left no family.
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Pigot, Hugh (1769-1797)

​PIGOT, HUGH (1769–1797), captain in the navy, son of Admiral Hugh Pigot (1721?–1792) [q. v.], was baptised in the parish church of Patshull in Staffordshire ​on 5 Sept. 1769. He entered the navy in May 1782 with his father on board the Jupiter, followed him to the Formidable, and from October 1783 to August 1785 served on board the Assistance on the North American station, with Sir Charles Douglas. He was afterwards in the Trusty, flagship of Sir John Laforey, on the Leeward Islands station, and passed his examination on 31 Aug. 1789. On 21 Sept. 1790 he was promoted to be lieutenant of the Colossus with Captain Hugh Cloberry Christian [q. v.], in the Channel, and in 1793–4 was in the London with Captain (afterwards Sir) Richard Goodwin Keats [q. v.] On 10 Feb. 1794 he was promoted to the rank of commander and appointed to the Swan sloop on the Jamaica station; from her, on 1 Sept. 1794, he was posted to the Success frigate, and in July 1797 was moved to the Hermione of 32 guns. He is said to have been already known as a man of harsh and tyrannical disposition, and the crew of the Hermione, with many Irishmen and foreigners in it, was one peculiarly apt to be affected by the wave of mutiny which swept over the service in 1797. The story afterwards told, which there is no reason to disbelieve, was that on the afternoon of 21 Sept., when they were reefing topsails, Pigot called to the men on the mizen-topsail yard that he would flog the last man down. Two of them, in the hurry to avoid the promised flogging, lost their hold, fell on the quarter-deck, and were killed; on which Pigot exclaimed, ‘Throw the lubbers overboard.’ The same night the crew rose, cut down the officer of the watch, killed Pigot by repeated blows and stabs, killed or threw overboard all the officers, with the exception of the master, gunner, carpenter, and a midshipman, and took the ship into La Guayra. There they handed her over to the Spaniards, who fitted her out as a ship of war under their own flag. In the following year she was gallantly recaptured after a most determined resistance [see Hamilton, Sir Edward]. In the course of the next few years many of the murderers were hanged and gibbeted. The several courts-martial did not err on the side of mercy.
J. K. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Pigott, Edward

​PIGOTT, EDWARD (fl. 1768–1807), astronomer, was the son, probably the eldest son, of Nathaniel Pigott [q. v.] of Whitton, Middlesex. The phenomena of Jupiter's satellites were observed by him with a view to longitude-determinations from 1768; and he watched, at a station near Caen, the transit of Venus of 3 June 1769. He aided his father's geodetical operations in Flanders in 1772, and surveyed the country near the mouth of the Severn in 1778–9 (Phil. Trans. lxxx. 385). On 23 March 1779 he discovered at Frampton House, Glamorganshire, a nebula in Coma Berenices (ib. lxxi. 82), and at York, on 22 Nov. 1783, the comet which bears his name (ib. lxxiv. 20, 460). But although its period has since been computed at 5.8 years, it has not reappeared. His deaf and dumb friend John Goodricke [q. v.] co-operated with him in observing it.
The variability in light of η Aquilæ was detected by Pigott on 10 Sept. 1784, and on 5 Dec. he assigned to its changes a period (about 26 minutes too long) of 7 days 4 hours 38 minutes (ib. lxxv. 127). He also essayed the establishment of an artificial system of photometry. A catalogue of fifty variable or suspected stars was published by him in 1786 (ib. lxxvi. 189), with the remark that ‘these discoveries may, at some future period, throw fresh light on astronomy.’ In a paper on the geographical co-ordinates of York he gave, in the same year, the first practical application of the method of longitudes by lunar transits, independently struck out by him (ib. p. 409). On 3 May 1786 he observed the transit of Mercury at Louvain (ib. p. 389), and after his return to England sent to the Royal Society an account of an auroral display viewed at Kensington on 23 Feb. 1789 (ib. lxxx. 47). His next residence was apparently at Bath, where he discovered the fluctuations of R Coronæ and R Scuti (ib. lxxxvii. 133). Six years later he gave a further discussion, from fresh materials, of the latter star's period (ib. xcv. 131). The conclusion of this paper was written at Fontainebleau in 1803. In it he strove to account for the observed irregular waxings and wanings of stellar brightness by the rotation of globes illuminated in patches. He inferred, moreover, the existence of multitudes of ‘dark stars,’ and surmised that the ‘coal-sacks’ in the Milky Way might be due to their aggregations. Pigott is said by Mädler to have been an early observer of the great comet of 1807. This is the last we hear of him.
A. M. C.