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

​KNIGHT, JAMES (d. 1719?), arctic voyager, for many years an agent of the Hudson's Bay Company, appears to have been governor of Fort Albany in 1693. In 1714 he was appointed governor of the Nelson River settlement, and in 1717 or 1718 established Prince of Wales's fort at the mouth of Churchill River. From the friendly Indians he heard of a mine, which may possibly have been copper, or more probably pyrites, such as had formerly beguiled Frobisher, but which his fancy at once set down as gold. He hastened to England and urged the company to fit out an expedition to search for it. The company reluctantly equipped two vessels, which sailed in June 1719, with instructions to search for the Straits of Anian and to discover gold and other valuable commodities to the northward. Except so far as related to the conduct of the ships, the command was vested in Knight. Nothing further was heard of them, and it was at first supposed that they had found the fabled straits and were returning to England from the Pacific. But in 1722 a search expedition was sent out under the command of Captain John Scroggs. It met with no success, and the fate of Knight and his companions remained shrouded in mystery till in 1767 the ships' hulls, some of their guns and anchors, and other traces of the presence of Europeans were found at Marble Island by a whaling party. Further examination among the Eskimos elicited the facts that the ships had arrived late in the autumn, presumably of 1719, that in getting into the harbour one, or, more probably, both of them sustained serious damage, that the men built a house and sojourned there that winter and the next, suffering great hardships. At the beginning of the second winter the original fifty had dwindled to twenty, and at the end of that winter to five, all of whom died shortly after, in May or June 1721. As Knight is described as a very old man, verging on eighty, we may conjecture that he died among the first, that is in the end of 1719 or early months of 1720.
[Barrow's Chron. Hist. of Voyages into the Arctic Regions, p. 271; Joseph Robson's Account of Six Years' Residence in Hudson's Bay (1752), p. 36; Sam. Hearne's Journey from Prince of Wales's Fort in Hudson's Bay to the Northern Ocean (1795), p. xxviii; Report from the Committee appointed to Inquire into the State and Condition of the Countries adjoining to Hudson's Bay (1749), p. 49.]
J. K. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Knight, John (1612-1683)

​KNIGHT, Sir JOHN, ‘the elder’ (1612–1683), mayor of Bristol, third son of George Knight, provision merchant, by his wife Anne, daughter of William Dyos, was born in Bristol in 1612. He inherited his father's business in Temple Street, and became one of the most prosperous merchants in the city, and a prominent high church member of the common council. He was knighted by Charles II on 5 Sept. 1663, on the occasion of the king's visit to Bristol, and was elected mayor in the same year. His tenure of office was distinguished by his persecution of quakers, Knight paying large sums to have their houses watched, and concerting measures with Guy Carleton [q. v.], bishop of Bristol, for their punishment. Nine hundred and twenty persons are said to have suffered for their religion during his mayoralty, and many moderate churchmen were scandalised by the mayor's rushing out of church on Sundays in pursuit of recalcitrant nonconformists. Knight's intolerance, however, only increased with years, and in 1669 he denounced the other members of the common council, including his namesake, John Knight [see Knight, John, fl. 1670, under Knight, Sir John, ‘the younger’], who was mayor of Bristol in the following year, as ‘fanaticks.’ He took a prominent part in the reception of Queen Catherine in 1677. In 1680, ‘by reason of his infirmity,’ he desired the city to nominate some other persons to take care of their affairs in the common council, but though he no longer had any official status he still occasionally acted as an informer. His antipathy to Roman catholics was quite as strong as that against protestant nonconformists, and in 1681 he was fined for an assault, and for calling several members of the common council ‘papists, popish dogs, jesuits, and popish devils.’
He had in the August of the previous year acted as emissary from William Bedloe [q. v.] to Chief-justice North previous to the latter's receiving Bedloe's dying deposition, and it is apropos of this that Roger North sums him up as ‘the most perverse, clamorous old party man in the whole city or nation’ (Examen, p. 253). Knight represented Bristol during the parliaments of 1661, 1678, and 1679, and was highly indignant at not being re-elected in 1681. He died in 1683, and was buried in the Temple Church, Bristol. By his wife Martha, daughter of Thomas Cole, esq., of Bristol, he left three sons and eight daughters.
[Le Neve's Knights, p. 175; Barrett's Bristol, p. 695; Seyer's Memoirs, ii. 543; Evans's Chronological Hist. p. 245; Garrard's Life and Times of Edward Colston, pp. 278, &c.]
T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Knight, John (d.1606)

​KNIGHT, JOHN (d. 1606), mariner, apparently of Scottish birth, was in 1605 associated with two other Scots, Cunningham and Lyon, in command of a Danish expedition to the coast of Greenland, which sailed from Copenhagen on 2 May. On the 30th, in lat. 59° 50′, they sighted high land, which they called Cape Christian, but the ice prevented them from reaching it. On 12 June they sighted high land on the west coast of Greenland, and named Cape Anna after James I's queen, Cape Sophia after her mother, King Christian's Fjord, and Cunningham Fjord, in lat. 67° 10′. Some small islands off Cape Sophia were named Knight's Islands (Danish Gov. Chart, 1832). This marks the extent of their voyage, of which few particulars have been preserved. They returned to Copenhagen in August, and Knight, passing on to England, was in the next year employed by the East India merchants to discover the north-west passage. In the Hopewell of forty tons he sailed from Gravesend on 18 April 1606, and, leaving the Orkneys on 12 May, fell in with a large ice-field, and after a long passage made the coast of Labrador, in about lat. 57°, on 19 June. The ice was still very troublesome, and after pushing through it for a couple of days the Hopewell anchored. In a violent gale on ​the 23rd and 24th the cables parted and the ship drove ashore. She was got afloat again, but her rudder was torn off, and she was making a great deal of water. Gorrell, the mate, was sent on shore to look for a place where she could be beached for repairs, and as he was unsuccessful, on the next day, 26 June, Knight went himself with Gorrell and four men. Leaving two men in the boat, Knight and his three companions went inland over a hill, and were never seen again. It was concluded that they were killed by the natives—little people, tawny-coloured, flat-nosed, with thin or no beards. The survivors on board repaired the ship as they best could, not without opposition from the Eskimos, and so reached Newfoundland, whence they sailed on 22 Aug., and arrived at Dartmouth on 24 Sept.
[Markham's Voyages of Sir James Lancaster, &c. (Hakluyt Soc. vol. lvi.); Purchas his Pilgrimes, pt. iii. p. 827.]
J. K. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Key, Charles Aston

​KEY, CHARLES ASTON (1793–1849), surgeon, born in Southwark on 6 Oct. 1793, was eldest son of Thomas Key, medical practitioner, and Margaret Barry. Thomas Hewitt Key [q. v.] was a half-brother by a second marriage. Aston Key was educated at Buntingford grammar school, Hertfordshire, and was apprenticed to his father in 1810. He attended the lectures at the United Borough Hospitals in 1812, and became a pupil at Guy's in 1814. In 1815 his apprenticeship to his father was cancelled, and he became pupil of Astley Cooper at a large premium. In 1817–18 he lived with Cooper, and in 1818 married Cooper's niece, Anne Cooper. Key became demonstrator of anatomy at St. Thomas's Hospital, but resigned the post in February 1823, though he gave some of Sir Astley Cooper's surgical lectures for two sessions afterwards. Key had qualified at the Royal College of Surgeons in 1821, and in the autumn of the same year was appointed the first assistant surgeon to Guy's, succeeding to a full surgeoncy in January 1824. In this year he introduced the operation for ​lithotomy with the straight staff, using only a single knife all through; the success of his operations established his reputation as a surgeon. He gained a large practice, and was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. In 1825, on the separation of Guy's from St. Thomas's medical schools [see Cooper, Sir Astley Paston], Key was appointed lecturer on surgery at Guy's, and his classes were for many years very popular. He resigned the lectureship in 1844. In 1845 he was one of the first elected fellows of the Royal College of Surgeons, and in the same year became a member of its council. In 1847 he was appointed surgeon to Prince Albert. He died of cholera on 23 Aug. 1849, leaving nine children. His son Sir Astley Cooper Key is separately noticed.
Key was a great surgical operator and lecturer, his lectures being largely the results of his own experience. He was not a well-read man nor a scientific pathologist. He was one of the first surgeons in London to use ether as an anæsthetic. His dexterity with the knife was remarkable; he was never known to make a mistake through inattention to details. In person he was of commanding presence, thin, and rather tall, with a slightly aquiline nose.
Key contributed to the ‘Guy's Hospital Reports’ some valuable papers on hernia, lithotomy, and other subjects. He also wrote:
* ‘A Short Treatise on the Section of the Prostate Gland in Lithotomy,’ 4to, 4 plates, London, 1824.
* ‘A Memoir on the Advantages and Practicability of Dividing the Stricture in Strangulated Hernia on the outside of the Sac,’ 8vo, London, 1833;
and he edited the second edition of Sir Astley Cooper's work on hernia, 1827.
[Brit. and For. Med.-Chir. Review, iv. 572–7; Lancet, 1849, ii. 300, 411; Wilks and Bettany's Biog. Hist. of Guy's Hospital.]
G. T. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Key, John

​KEY, Sir JOHN (1794–1858), lord mayor of London, eldest son of John Key of Denmark Hill, Surrey, was born on 16 Aug. 1794. He entered his father's business, that of a wholesale stationer, about 1818. The firm had been established in the last century, and then traded as Key Brothers & Son, at 30 Abchurch Lane. After several changes of abode the business was finally removed to 97 and 103 Newgate Street. Key was elected alderman for the ward of Langbourn on 8 April 1823, and served the office of sheriff of London and Middlesex in the ensuing year. He served the office of master of the Stationers' Company in 1830, and in the same year was elected lord mayor. He was one of the leading supporters of the Reform Bill in the city, and received the unusual honour of re-election to the mayoralty in the following year. During his second mayoralty, when William IV and Queen Adelaide had arranged to visit the city in order to open new London Bridge, Key suffered some loss of popularity by advising the king and his ministers not to come to the city on account of the supposed unpopularity of the Duke of Wellington. The visit passed off satisfactorily, and Key was created a baronet by William IV on 17 Aug. 1831. He was elected member of parliament for the city in 1833. He removed in 1851 from Langbourn to the ward of Bridge Without, which he represented until 1853. In that year he was elected chamberlain of London after a poll, his opponent being Benjamin Scott [q. v.], who afterwards succeeded him in that office.
Key died on 15 July 1858, leaving by his wife Charlotte, youngest daughter of Francis Green, esq., of Dorking, Surrey, a son, Sir Kingsmill Key, who succeeded him in the baronetcy, and three daughters.
[Records of the Corporation of London; City Press, 1858; Orridge's Citizens of London and their Rulers; Foster's Peerage and Baronetage; Kent's and Post Office London Directories.]
C. W-h.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Keyes, Roger

​KEYES or KEYS, ROGER (d. 1477), architect and warden of All Souls' College, Oxford, is first mentioned in 1437, when, together with John Druell, afterwards archdeacon of Exeter, he was architect and inspector of works at the building of All Souls' College, Oxford, by Archbishop Chichele [q. v.] He was one of the original fellows of the college, and succeeded Richard Andrews as warden in 1442, holding that post for three years. In 1448 Keyes was summoned by Henry VI to act as clerk of the works for the new royal foundation of Eton College, with a salary of 50l. a year. For his services at Eton he and his brother, Thomas Keys, received a grant of arms and patent of nobility from the king on 19 May 1449, and he was collated to the archdeaconry of Barnstaple, 25 Jan. 1449–50. Keyes acted as precentor of Exeter Cathedral in 1467 and 1469, and apparently held the post till his death. In 1469 he made a present of books to Exeter College, Oxford. Keyes died on 11 Nov. 1477, and was buried at Exeter.
[Dict. of Architecture; Burrows's Worthies of All Souls; Bentley's Excerpta Historica; Anthony à Wood's Hist. of Oxford; Willis and Clark's Architectural Hist. of Cambridge; Le Neve's Fasti Eccl. Angl. i. 407, 411.]
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Keys, Mary

​KEYS, Lady MARY (1540?–1578), third surviving daughter of Henry Grey, third marquis of Dorset [q. v.], by his wife Frances, daughter of Charles Brandon, duke of Suffolk, was born at Bradgate Hall, Leicestershire, probably in 1540. Her sister Lady Jane [see Dudley, Jane] and father were beheaded in 1554, and her mother died in November 1559. It would seem that Queen Elizabeth soon after her accession took the two remaining daughters, Mary and her elder sister, Catherine, who were the last representatives of the Brandon line of the Tudor house, as maids of honour into her court, that she might keep close watch over their matrimonial plans. Great was the dismay of all the ministers when, in August 1565, it became known that Lady Mary Grey had secretly married Thomas Keys, the queen's serjeant-porter (Letter of Cecil in Wright, Queen Elizabeth, i. 207). The matter was ludicrous, because Mary Grey was almost a dwarf, and Keys, who had been chosen for his office for his size, was of huge proportions. Further, there was the disparity of age and station. Keys was a native of Kent, probably related to Richard Keys of Folkestone, who received from Henry VIII a grant of the monastery of St. Rhadegund in that town. He had been twenty-two years at court, and was a widower with several children. Elizabeth showed her anger by committing Keys to the Fleet, and sending Lady Mary to the care of William Hawtrey at Chequers, Buckinghamshire. In August 1567 she was transferred to the charge of the Dowager Duchess of Suffolk, and in June 1569 to Sir Thomas Gresham. Meanwhile the luckless Keys was pestered by a lawsuit which he had on hand at the time of his committal, and pleaded vainly for release. The question of the legality of the marriage was referred to Grindal, bishop of London, who reported to Cecil that it was impossible to accept a renunciation of the marriage; if its validity was questioned, he must judge according to the evidence. Elizabeth seems to have thought it best to keep the culprits in custody. Keys was liberated from prison in 1568, but was ordered to live at Lewisham; in May 1570 he was at Sandgate Castle, whence he implored Archbishop Parker to intercede on his behalf. On 8 Sept. 1571 he died, and Gresham had to write to Cecil for permission for his widow to wear mourning. She grieved over her husband's death, expressed her determination to keep and bring up his children, and from that time forward signed herself Mary Keys. As she was then harmless to the queen, she was allowed to leave Gresham's custody in 1573, and died in a little house in London on 20 April 1578. She was buried in the church of St. Botolph Without Aldersgate. Her will is given in Strype's ‘Annals,’ ii. ii. 210–11.
[Burgon's Life of Sir Thomas Gresham, ii. 386–415; Cal. of State Papers, Dom. Elizabeth.]
M. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Keys, Samuel

​KEYS, SAMUEL (1771–1850), china-painter, born in 1771, was one of the principal gilders and china-painters in the old Derby china factory under William Duesbury the elder [q. v.], to whom Keys was articled. He was an excellent workman, and much of the success of the china, especially the figures in the Dresden style, was owing to his skill in decoration. Keys quitted Derby some years before the close of the factory, and went to work under Minton at Stoke-upon-Trent. He returned later to Derby, where he died in 1850, in his eightieth year. Keys preserved his delicacy of execution to the last. He collected materials for the history of the Derby china factory, which form the foundation of subsequent accounts.
Keys left three sons, all apprenticed at the Derby factory. John Keys (1797–1825) became a skilled flower-painter in water-colour, and teacher of that art. Edward Keys left Derby, and subsequently went to work for ​Messrs. Minton, Daniell, and others in the Potteries. Samuel Keys the younger excelled in modelling small figures; he left Derby in 1830, and went to the Potteries, where he carried on a small manufactory of his own, besides working for the leading manufacturers there.
[Haslem's Old Derby China Factory.]
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Keyse, Thomas

​KEYSE, THOMAS (1722–1800), still-life-painter, and proprietor of the Bermondsey Spa, born in 1722, and a self-taught artist, was a member of the Free Society of Artists, and exhibited with them from 1761 to 1764. He painted skilful imitations of still life, flowers or fruit. From 1765 to 1768 he was an occasional exhibitor at the Society of Artists, and twice sent pictures to the Royal Academy. In 1768 he obtained a premium from the Society of Arts for a new method of setting crayon drawings. About 1770 Keyse opened a tea-garden in Bermondsey, where a chalybeate spring had been found, which was known as the Bermondsey Spa. Here, among other attractions, Keyse kept a permanent exhibition of his own drawings. Obtaining a music license, he made the gardens a kind of Vauxhall, open in the evening during the summer months, and provided fireworks, including a set-piece of the siege of Gibraltar, constructed and designed by Keyse himself. Keyse died at his gardens 8 Feb. 1800, in his seventy-ninth year. The gardens remained open for about five years longer, and their memory is preserved by the Spa Road, Bermondsey. A portrait of Keyse, painted by S. Drummond, A.R.A., was engraved.
[Redgrave's Dict. of Artists; Gent. Mag. 1800, pt. i. 284; Lysons's Environs of London, i. 558; Catalogues of the Free Society of Artists, &c.; Wheatley and Cunningham's London Past and Present.]
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Keyl, Frederick William

​KEYL, FREDERICK WILLIAM (Friedrich Wilhelm) (1823–1873), animal painter, born at Frankfort-on-the-Maine on 17 Sept. 1823, showed at an early age a taste for drawing animals, and became a pupil of Eugene Verboeckhoven at Brussels. In May 1845 he came to London for the purpose of studying under Sir Edwin Landseer [q. v.] Landseer received Keyl as a pupil, and became much attached to him. Through Landseer Keyl was introduced to Queen Victoria and the prince consort, and obtained many commissions from the royal family. Keyl was a frequent exhibitor at the Royal Academy and British Institution, though he was naturally averse to exhibiting his works. He died in London on 5 Dec. 1873, and was buried in Kensal Green cemetery. There are three pleasing drawings by Keyl in the print room at the British Museum.
[Redgrave's Dict. of Artists; Graves's Dict. of Artists, 1760–1880; Bryan's Dict. of Painters, ed. Graves; Men of the Reign.]
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Keynes, George

​KEYNES, GEORGE, alias Brett (1630–1659), jesuit, son of Edward Keynes of Compton Pauncefoot and his wife, Ann Brett, both of old Roman catholic families resident in Somerset, was born in 1630, and entered his novitiate as a jesuit at Rome 2 Jan. 1649. He studied at St. Omer, and, having been ordained priest, sailed for the China mission in December 1654, but died at the Philippine Islands in 1659. He published a translation of the ‘Roman Martyrology,’ of which a second and much enlarged edition was printed at St. Omer in 1667.
[Foley's Records, iv. and vi. 371; Oliver's Collections, p. 125; Visitation of Somerset (Harl. Soc.), vol. xi.]
T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Cullum, Thomas (1587?-1664)

​CULLUM, Sir THOMAS (1587?–1664), sheriff of London, was the second son of John Cullum of Thorndon, Suffolk, and Rebecca, daughter of Thomas Smith of Bacton in the same county. As a younger son he was sent to London and apprenticed to one John Rayney, a draper, and on the expiration of his apprenticeship was taken by his master into partnership. Cullum by shrewdness and industry amassed a large fortune in his business in Gracechurch Street, and became an alderman and a member of the Drapers' Company. He married Mary, daughter and coheiress of Nicholas Crisp, alderman of London, through whom he became related to the well-known royalist, Sir Nicholas Crisp [q. v.] Like him he espoused the royal cause, and paid dearly for it. Alderman of Cordwainer ward 1643–52, he in 1646 was sheriff of London, and in 1647 was committed to the Tower, with the lord mayor, Sir John Gayer, and other aldermen, for having been concerned in some royalist outbreak in the city. They published a declaration in their ​defence, which was printed. About 1642 he had been appointed to the lucrative office of commissioner of excise. In 1656 Cullum retired from business and purchased the estates of Hawsted and Hardwick, near Bury St. Edmunds in Suffolk, whither he retired. At the Restoration he was rewarded by being created a baronet on 18 June 1660, but he seems to have fallen into disfavour with the ruling powers, as on 17 July 1661 he had a pardon under the great seal for all treasons and rebellions, with all their concomitant enormities, committed by him before the 29th of the preceding December. Some crimes were excepted from the general pardon (which is still preserved at Hardwick House), as burglaries, perjuries, forgeries, &c., including witchcraft. It is not clear in what way Cullum transgressed the royal favour, but we find that he was compelled to disburse a large sum of money in connection with the excise, the profits of which were granted to James, duke of York; this he seems to have paid into the exchequer in 1663 to buy his peace, he being then seventy-six years of age. He died at Hawsted 6 April 1664, in his seventy-eighth year, and was buried there. By his wife, who died 22 July 1637, aged 35, and was buried in All-hallows, Lombard Street, he was the father of five sons and six daughters. There are two portraits of him at Hardwick House, one in his alderman's gown and another in his sheriff's robes; the latter was engraved by James Basire (1730–1802) for Sir John Cullum's ‘History of Hardwick and Hawsted,’ and is there attributed erroneously to Sir Peter Lely; it is more probably by Cornelius Janssen.
[Cullum's Hist. of Hawsted and Hardwick; Granger's Biog. Hist. of England; Gage's History of Thingoe Hundred, Suffolk; Calendar of State Papers, Dom. Ser. 1663; family papers, &c., in the possession of G. Milner Gibson-Cullum, F.S.A., at Hardwick, Bury St. Edmunds.]
L. C.