OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Huntley, Henry Vere

​HUNTLEY, Sir HENRY VERE (1795–1864), captain in the navy, colonial governor, and author, was the third son of the Rev. Richard Huntley of Boxwell Court, Gloucestershire. He entered the navy in 1809, served on the West Indian and North American station, and in 1815 was in the Northumberland when she carried Bonaparte to St. Helena. In 1818 he was made lieutenant, and served in the Mediterranean successively in the Redpole and Parthian brigs; in the last he was wrecked on the coast of Egypt, 15 May 1828. He was afterwards at Portsmouth in the Ganges with Captain John Hayes [q.v.], whom he followed to the Dryad on the west coast of Africa, where, for the greater part of the time, he had command of one of her tenders, and cruised successfully against slavers. In 1833 he was appointed to the command of the Lynx on the same station, and in her also captured several slavers. In 1837 he was employed, in concert with Commander Craigie of the Scout, in negotiating a treaty with the king of Bonny, and was sent home with the account of the proceedings. In ​June 1838 he was promoted to the rank of commander, and in 1839 was appointed lieutenant-governor of the settlements on the river Gambia, in which capacity he had to repel the incursions of some of the adjacent tribes. In August 1841 he was appointed lieutenant-governor of Prince Edward's Island, and previous to going out was knighted, 9 Oct. 1841. He was afterwards arbitrator of the mixed courts at Loanda, and at a later date became consul at Santos in Brazil, where he died 7 May 1864. He was twice married, and left issue; his eldest son, Spencer Robert Huntley, a lieutenant in the navy, died in command of the Cherub on the North American and West Indian station in 1869.
While in command at Prince Edward's Island Huntley seems to have taken to literature as an amusement; and on his return to England published in rapid succession:
* 'Peregrine Scramble, or Thirty Years' Adventures of a Bluejacket' (in 2 vols. post 8vo, 1849), in very obvious and feeble imitation of Captain Marryat.
* 'Observations upon the Free Trade policy of England in connection with the Sugar Act of 1846' (8vo, 1849), an exaggerated protest against the policy adopted.
* 'Seven Years' Service on the Slave Coast of Western Africa' (2 vols. post 8vo, 1850), a personal narrative.
* 'California, its Gold and its Inhabitants' (2 vols. post 8vo, 1856).
Many of Huntley's official reports on African questions were also published in the different blue-books.
[O'Byrne's Nav. Biog. Dict.; Gent. Mag. 1864, pt. ii. p.112.]
J. K. L.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Huntingfield, William de

​HUNTINGFIELD, WILLIAM de (fl.1220), justice itinerant, was the son of Roger de Huntingfield. He was appointed constable of Dover Castle on 16 Sept. 1203, and gave his son and daughter as hostages for the safe holding of it (Rot. Pat. 5 Joh.) In the same year he received a grant of the wardship of the lands and heir of Osbert Fitz Osbert (ib.}, and in 1208 had charge of the lands of his brother Roger (who was also a justiciar), which had been seized in consequence of the interdict (Rot. Claus. i. 110). From 1208 to 1210 he was one of the justices before whom fines were levied, and from 1210 to 1214 he was sheriff of the united counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. So far he was in favour with King John, but next year he joined the confederate barons (Matt, Paris, ii. 585), was one of the twenty-five appointed to secure the observance of Magna Charta (ib. ii. 605), and a witness to the charter granting freedom of election to the abbeys (ib. ii. 610). He was one of the barons ex-communicated by Innocent III in 1216 (ib. ii. 644), and his lands were taken into the king's lands (Rot. Claus. 16 Joh.) He reduced Essex and Suffolk for Lewis of France, and in retaliation John plundered his estates in Norfolk and Suffolk (Matt, Paris, ii. 655, 665). Huntingfield was one of the barons taken prisoner at Lincoln on 20 May 1217 (Cont. Gervase, ii. 111, in Rolls Ser.); but on the conclusion of peace returned to his allegiance, and in October was restored to his lands (Rot. Claus. 1 Hen. III). In 1219 he had leave to go on the crusade and appoint his brother Thomas to act on his behalf during his absence. He married Alice de St. Liz, and is said to have died in 1240, but in 1226 his son Roger sued his bailiff for arrears of rents.
William de Huntingfield's great-grandson Roger was summoned to parliament by Edward I in 1294 and 1297, and this Roger's great-grandson William was summoned from 1351 to 1376, but on his death without issue in 1377 the barony fell into abeyance.
[Matt. Paris, in Rolls Ser.; Foss's Judges of England, ii. 83; Dugdale's Baronage, ii. 7; Burke's Dormant and Extinct Peerages, p. 293.]
C. L. K.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Huntington, John

​HUNTINGTON, JOHN (fl. 1553), poet and preacher, was apparently educated at Oxford, where he became 'noted among his contemporaries for a tolerable poet.' He published about 1540 a poem in doggerel verse, with the title, 'The Genealogy of Heretics' which is only known from Bale's reprint of it in 'A mysterye of inyquyte contayned within the heretycall Genealogye of Ponce Pantolabus is here both dysclosed & confuted by Johan Bale, an. 1542,' Geneva, 1545. Bale states in his preface that he saw Huntington's 'abhomynable jest' three years previously in two forms; that there were still a 'wonderfull nombre of copyes' abroad; that Huntington's printers were John Redman and Robert Wyer; and that Huntington, since 'converted to repentance,' doubtless detested his work. In 1541 Huntington, described as 'the preacher,' was one of three informers against a Scottish friar, Seton, for heresy; in 1545 Anne Askew gave his name as a man of wisdom by whom she was willing to be shriven; in 1547 he was preaching at Boulogne, apparently on the reformers' side, and saved from prison a gunner, William Hastlen, accused of heresy. In December 1553 he was brought before the council for writing a poem against Dr. Stokes and the sacrament, but by recanting and humbly submitting he contrived to escape unpunished to Germany. On the accession of Elizabeth he would seem to have returned, since his name is mentioned as preaching before large audiences at Paul's Cross in August and September 1559. He was admitted canon of Exeter on 16 May 1560. He is said to have written, besides the Genealogy,' 'Epitaphium Ricardi Pacaei' (Wood and Pits give differing first lines for this); 'Humanæ Vitæ Deploratio; "De lapsu Philosophiæ,' and several sermons. A manuscript entitled 'Meditationes Itineraries de Immortalitate Animæ' (Sloane MS. 2556) has been ascribed to Huntington, and has his surname written on the first page.
[Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss), i. 241; Tanner's Bibl. Brit p. 423; Pits, App. p. 876; Strype's Annals, I. i. 199, 200; Strype's Mem. I. i. 572; Strype's Grindal, p. 39; Foxe's' Acts and Monuments, v. 449, 539, 568, 836, viii. 716, 717; A Dysclosynge or Openynge of the Manne of Synne, &c., compyled by J. Harryson, pp. 12, 98.
R. B.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Huntley, Francis

​HUNTLEY, FRANCIS (1787?–1831), actor, born in Barnsley, Yorkshire, lost his father while young, and claimed, vain gloriously as is supposed, to have been educated at Douglas's academy in South Audley Street, and articled to a surgeon. After some practice in London as an amateur, he began his professional career at Brecknock about 1806, under R. Phillips. A bad start was made, and he appeared with no more success at the Lyceum under Laurent. With Beverley, at the Richmond Theatre, he remained for some time, studying and rising in his profession. After performing at Stamford and Nottingham, he played Othello to the Iago of Carey, otherwise Kean, at the Birmingham Theatre, under Watson. Under Ryley at Bolton he was seen by Elliston [q. v.], who engaged him for Manchester, and brought him subsequently to the Olympic and to the Surrey, where in the summer of 1809 he appeared as Lockit in the 'Beggar's Opera' to Elliston's Macheath. On 25 Nov. 1811, as King James in the 'Knight of Snowdoun' an operatic adaptation by Morton of the 'Lady of the Lake' he was seen for the first time at Covent Garden. Romaldi in the 'Tale of Mystery' followed on the 27th, and on 11 Dec. Wilford in the 'Iron Chest.' On 31 Jan. 1812 he was the original Don Alonzo in Reynolds's 'Virgin of the Sun.' At Easter he returned to the Surrey, and went thence to Dublin, where during two seasons he played leading business at the Smock Alley Theatre. After this he was seen at the Olympic, again with Dibdin at the Surrey, at the Coburg, the Royalty, the West London where he opened as Œdipus to the Jocasta of Mrs. Julia Glover [q.v.] at Astley's, and then again at the Coburg and the Surrey. In his later years he was known as the 'Roscius of the Coburg,' at which house he was principally seen. He was a well-built man, about 5 ft. 10 in. in height, dark, with an expressive face, great command of feature, and a clear and powerful voice, the undertones of which had much sweetness. Before ruining himself by drunkenness and other irregularities of life, and by playing to vulgar audiences, he had great powers of expressing rage, fear, despair, and other strong passions. He was seen to advantage in Tom Jones, Edward the Black Prince, Fazio, Lockit, George Barnwell, and the Vicar of Wakefield. A portrait of him as Balfour of Burley is given in Oxberry's 'Dramatic Biography,' new series, vol. i. His death, which took place 'lately, aged 48,' according to the 'Gentleman's Magazine' of April 1831 (pt. i. p. 376), was hastened by intemperance. Oxberry (Dramatic Chronology) doubtfully says he was born in 1785, died in 1823, and was buried in Walworth. When at the Surrey with Honeyman the lessee, who was also a publican, his terms are said to have been a guinea a night and as much brandy as he could drink. He married about 1808, but separated from his wife, by whom he had a child. Another Frank Huntley, who was subsequently on the stage, may have been his son.
[Books cited; Genest's Account of the English Stage; Oxberry's Dramatic Biography, 2nd ser. vol. i.; Georgian Era, iv. 571.]
J. K.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Odger, George

​ODGER, GEORGE (1820–1877), trade unionist, the son of a Cornish miner, was born in 1820 at Roborough, between Tavistock and Plymouth. A shoemaker by trade, he settled in London, where he became a prominent member of the ladies' shoemakers' society, a union of highly skilled makers of ladies' shoes. He acquired great influence with the working classes, and on the lock-out in the building trades in 1859 he rendered important service to their cause. A leading member of the London trades council from its formation in 1860, he succeeded George Howell as secretary in 1862, and retained the office until the reconstruction of the council in 1872. As one of a small but powerful group of trade-union officials, he exercised remark​able influence on the movement during the following years. Believing that the most advantageous policy for the working classes was the combination of trade-unionism with political action, he endeavoured to induce the council to adopt it. Under his influence the council organised a popular welcome to Garibaldi, and a great meeting in St. James's Hall in 1862 in support of the Northern States of America in their struggle against slavery, at which John Bright was the principal speaker. He became a member of the National Reform League; and, in conjunction with Applegarth, Allan, and Coulson, persuaded the trades council to take a leading part in the agitation for the extension of the franchise in 1866 and subsequent years. He made five unsuccessful attempts to get into parliament as an independent labour candidate—at Chelsea in 1868, at Stafford in 1869, at Bristol in 1870, where he retired rather than divide the liberal vote, and at Southwark in 1870 and 1874. At the Southwark election in 1870 he polled 4,382 votes, while the liberal candidate, Sir Sydney Waterlow, polled only 2,966. Odger became president of the general council of the famous international association of working men in 1870. In 1872 he was made the subject of a series of attacks in the London ‘Figaro,’ and he brought an action for libel against the publisher. The case was tried on 14 Feb. 1873, and resulted in a verdict for the defendant. Odger died in 1877. His funeral, which was attended by Herbert Spencer, Professor Fawcett, and Sir Charles Dilke, was made the occasion of a great demonstration by the London working men, who regarded him as their leader.
[Life and Labours of George Odger; Odger's Reply to the Attorney-General [1873]; McCarthy's History of our own Time, iii. 228, iv. 95, 179; Sidney and Beatrice Webb's History of Trade Unionism, pp. 215, 217, 218, 220, 221, 228, 230, 231, 271, 273, 275, 282, 309, 347, 382.]
W. A. S. H.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Odingsells, Gabriel

​ODINGSELLS, GABRIEL (1690–1734), playwright, son of Gabriel Odingsells of London, was born in 1690, and matriculated from Pembroke College, Oxford, on 23 April 1706. He left Oxford without a degree, and essayed to obtain the reputation of a wit in London. In 1725 appeared his first comedy, ‘The Bath Unmasked’ (London, 4to), in which he attempted with indifferent success to describe the humours of the city of Bath. It was acted on 27 Feb. and on six subsequent occasions at Lincoln's Inn Fields. It was followed, at the same theatre, on 8 Dec. by ‘The Capricious Lovers’ (London, 1726, 4to), a poor comedy, relieved, however, by one humorous character, Mrs. Mince-Mode, who ‘grows sick at the sight of a man, and refines upon the significancy of phrases till she resolves common conversation into obscenity.’ In March 1730 his third and last piece, ‘Bays' Opera’ (London, 1730, 4to), was acted three times, twice more than it deserved, at Drury Lane. Odingsells shortly afterwards developed symptoms of lunacy, and on 10 Feb. 1734 he hanged himself in his house in Thatched Court, Westminster. In 1742 was published, posthumously, ‘Monumental Inscriptions; or a Curious Collection of Near Five Hundred of the most Remarkable Epitaphs, serious and humourous. Collected by the late ingenious Gabriel Odinsells [sic],’ London, 4to. The copy of this rare work in the British Museum Library is imperfect, many of the coarser epitaphs having been effaced.
[Baker's Biographia Dramatica, i. 547; Genest's History of the Stage, iii. 167, 177; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714; Doran's Annals of the Stage; Rawlinson MSS. in Bodleian Library, vi. 35, xxi. 50; Odingsells's Works in the British Museum Library.]
T. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Octa

​OCTA, OCGA, OHT, or OIRIC (d. 532?), king of Kent, son of Æsc or Oisc [q. v.], the son of Hengest [q. v.], succeeded his father in or about 512, and is supposed to have reigned over the Jutish invaders and conquerors of Kent about twenty years (Hen. Hunt.); he may therefore have died about 532. He left a son named Eormenric, who succeeded him. William of Malmesbury notes that Octa and Eormenric reigned between them for fifty-three years, that is until 565, when Eormenric was succeeded by his son Ethelbert, or Æthelberht (552?–616) [q. v.], but says ​that it is uncertain whether Octa or Eormenric did not for a time share the kingship. Octa's reign is described as obscure. Having conquered Kent, the Jutes found themselves blocked from an advance westward by the Andredsweald, and from the Thames waterway by the bridge and defences of London, and seem to have remained quiet for a century after their victory of 473 (Green).
[Bede's Hist. Eccl. ii. c. 5 (Engl. Hist. Soc.); Hen. of Huntingdon, i. c. 40, Will. of Malmesbury's Gesta Regum, i. c. 8, De primo Sax. adventu ap. Symeon of Durham, ii. 367, all in the Rolls Ser.; Green's Making of England, p. 40.]
W. H.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Pricke, Robert

​PRICKE, ROBERT (fl. 1669–1698), engraver, was a pupil of Wenceslaus Hollar [q. v.], and kept a shop for prints and maps in Whitecross Street, Cripplegate, London, during the latter half of the seventeenth century. Here he published some important architectural works, mostly translated from the French, and illustrated with engravings by himself. These were: 1. ‘A new Treatise of Architecture according to Vitruvius,’ from the French of Julien Mauclerc, 1669 (other editions in 1670, 1676, and 1699). 2. ‘A new Book on Architecture, wherein is represented Forty Figures of Gates and Arches triumphant, &c. &c., by Alexander Francine, Florentine … set forth by Robert Pricke … 1669’ (with a portrait of Francini). 3. ‘The Art of Fair Building, wherein are Augmentations of the newest Buildings made in France, by the Designs and Ordering of P. le Muet, and others, published by Robert Pricke,’ 1670 (2nd edit. 1675). 4. ‘Perspective Practical, or a plain … method of … representing all things to the eye at a distance, by the exact Rules of Art. … By a Religious Person of the Society of Jesus, a Parisien [J. Dubreuil]. Faithfully translated out of French and illustrated with 150 copper cuts, set forth in English by R. Pricke,’ 1672 (2nd edition, 1698). 5. ‘The Ornaments of Architecture, containing Compartments, Mantlings, Foldings, Festones, &c., &c. … with some Designs for Carving and Painting of eminent Coaches. … Containing Fifty Copperplate Prints; collected out of the Works of several eminent Masters, and set forth by Robert Pricke,’ 1674. A few etchings of shipping, &c., were also executed by Pricke.
L. C.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Pridden, John

​PRIDDEN, JOHN (1758–1825), antiquary, eldest son of John Pridden, by his wife Anne, daughter of Humphrey Gregory of Whitchurch, Shropshire, was born in London on 3 Jan. 1758. The father (1728–1807), born on 20 July 1728 at Old Martin Hall, near Ellesmere, Shropshire, of wealthy parents, ran away from home to escape the cruel treatment of a stepfather, and obtained employment with Richard Manby, a bookseller of Ludgate Hill, whom he eventually succeeded. He was intimate with many well-known authors and antiquaries. His portrait appears in the ‘Fruits of Experience’ (2nd edit. 1824, p. 88), by Joseph Brasbridge [q. v.]
The son entered St. Paul's School on 3 Aug. 1764, aged 7, and proceeded on 15 April 1777 to Queen's College, Oxford, winning the Pauline exhibition in 1778. He graduated B.A. in 1781, and was ordained soon after. He was incorporated M.A. at St. John's College, Cambridge. He was successively afternoon lecturer at Tavistock Chapel, London (1782); minor canon of St. Paul's (November 1782); vicar of Heybridge, Essex (July 1783); curate (from 1783 to 1803) of St. Bride's, Fleet Street, where the rector was non-resident; vicar of Little Wakering, Essex (1788); chaplain to Earl Powlett (1789); priest in ordinary of his majesty's Chapel Royal (1795); minor canon of Westminster; vicar of Caddington, Bedfordshire, from 1797, when he resigned his Essex livings; and finally rector of the united parishes of St. George, Botolph Lane, and St. Botolph, Bishopsgate.
Pridden was at once an antiquary, an amateur artist and architect, and a philanthropist. He was elected F.S.A. in 1785. To the ‘Bibliotheca Topographica Britannica’ he contributed ‘Appendix to the History of Reculver and Herne’ (1787) and many drawings, especially in illustration of ​the Leicestershire collections of his father-in-law, John Nichols [q. v.] His most useful antiquarian achievement was the continuation of the index and glossary to the ‘Rolls of Parliament,’ which had been commenced by Archdeacon John Strachey [q. v.] Over this he spent thirty years. It was completed by Edward Upham, F.S.A., and published in 1832, London, fol.
His excursions into architecture resulted in a design for the sea-bathing infirmary at Margate, of which he was joint founder with Dr. John Coakley Lettsom [q. v.], and for many years honorary secretary; a new vicarage at Caddington in 1812, and a plan for uniting Snow Hill and Holborn Hill, which he submitted to the Corporation of London.
He died on 5 April 1825 at his house in Fleet Street, and was buried on 12 April at St. Mary's, Islington, beside his first wife, Anne, daughter of John Nichols. His second wife, Anne, daughter of Robert Pickwoad of London, survived him. He had no issue.
C. F. S.
# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Prideaux, Frederick

​PRIDEAUX, FREDERICK (1817–1891), conveyancer, fifth son of Walter Prideaux of Plymouth, by Sarah, daughter of ​Joseph Kingston of Kingsbridge, Devonshire, was born at No. 1 Portland Square, Plymouth, on 27 April 1817. His father, a partner in the private bank of Kingston & Prideaux (since converted into the Plymouth and Devonport Bank), was a collateral descendant of Humphrey Prideaux [q. v.], dean of Norwich, but was bred a quaker. Frederick Prideaux was educated at the Plymouth grammar school, at a private school at Egloshayle, near Wadebridge, Cornwall, and under a private tutor. He was instructed in law by his elder brother, Walter Prideaux, of the firm of Lane & Prideaux, solicitors, London, and by the eminent quaker conveyancer, John Hodgkin. On 26 May 1834 he was admitted a student at Lincoln's Inn, where he was called to the bar on 27 Jan. 1840. After practising for some years in London, he removed to Bath in 1858, but returned to London in 1865, and in 1866 obtained the post of reader in real and personal property to the Inns of Court, which he resigned in consequence of ill-health in 1875. He afterwards resided successively at Torquay, Gatcombe, and Taunton, where he died on 21 Nov. 1891. In early manhood Prideaux abandoned quakerism for the church of England, but in later life became attached to the Baptist society.
Prideaux was author of:
* ‘Law of Judgments and Crown Debts as they affect Real Property,’ London, 1842, 8vo; 4th edition 1854.
* ‘Handbook of Precedents in Conveyancing,’ London, 1852, 8vo; 2nd edition, under the title ‘Precedents in Conveyancing, with Dissertations on its Law and Practice,’ 1856; 4th edition, in which he was assisted by John Whitcombe, esq., 1864, 2 vols. 8vo. Successive editions of this standard work appeared at intervals throughout Prideaux's life; the fifteenth edition, by Mr. Whitcombe, in 1893, 2 vols. 8vo, and the sixteenth edition, by Messrs. Whitcombe and Horsburgh, in 1895, 2 vols. 8vo.
He married at Clifton, on 14 April 1853, Fanny Ash, second daughter of Richard Ball of Portland House, Kingsdown, Gloucestershire, who survived him, and died at Taunton in September 1894. Mrs. Prideaux was a poetess of some merit. Her works, all of which were published in London, are: 1. ‘Claudia,’ a story in blank verse, the scene of which is laid in Rome in the time of the Emperor Claudius, 1865, 8vo. 2. ‘The Nine Days' Queen,’ a dramatic poem founded on the history of Lady Jane Grey, 1869, 8vo. 3. ‘Philip Molesworth and other Poems,’ 1886, 8vo. 4. ‘Basil the Iconoclast,’ a drama of modern Russia, 1892, 8vo.
[In Memoriam F. P., by Mrs. Prideaux (printed for private circulation), 1891; Athenæum, 18 Sept. 1894.]
J. M. R.