William Gunn (writer)
William Gunn (1750–1841) was an English clergyman and miscellaneous writer. Life. Gunn was born on 7 April 1750 at Guildford, Surrey, the son of Alexander Gunn of Irstead, Norfolk. He attended Fletcher's private school at Kingston-upon-Thames for six years. In 1784 he entered Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, as a sizar. He took holy orders, in 1784 became rector of Sloley, Norfolk, and in 1786 obtained the consolidated livings of Barton Turf and Irstead. The latter he resigned in 1829 in favour of John Gunn, on receiving the vicarage of Gorleston, Suffolk. In 1795  he obtained the degree of B.D. as a 'ten-year man'. During a residence in Rome he obtained permission to search the Vatican and other libraries for manuscripts relating to the history of England, and published anonymously, as the result of his research, in 1803, a collection of "Extracts" from sixteenth-century state papers. In the Vatican he discovered a tenth-century manuscript of the "Historia Brittonum", commonly ascribed to Nennius, which he printed in 1819 with an English version, facsimile of the original, notes, and illustrations (another edition of the translation only, with a few additions, was published by  J. A. Giles in 1841). He died at Smallburgh, Norfolk, on 11 April 1841. Original register held by Norfolk Record Office (NRO: NCC, will register, Traxton, 203)