Author: Clotworthy Gillmor
Author: Clotworthy Gillmor (1818–1886)
Biography: Rev. Clotworthy Gillmor was born in 1818 in Bangor, Wales, the son of Clotworthy Gillmor (1773–1855), Commander R.N. and author of an undistinguished collection of poems (1849). He graduated Trinity College, Dublin, and took orders in 1841, later completing an M.A. at St. John's College, Cambridge, in 1845. In 1846, he married Mary Keeling Meigh, the daughter of an earthenware manufacturer. He served as rector of Shelton, Staffordshire, vicar of Dartford, Kent, and rector of Bow, Devon. Gillmor also briefly served as the chaplain at Boulogne (1865–67) where his wife died in 1865. In 1870, he married Frances Matilda Toovey. Besides a religious pamphlet defending the Anglican church published in 1849, Gillmor wrote one novel, Jessie of Boulogne: or, The History of a Few Minutes (1877), based on his short residency in France. The title is a non sequitur since the heroine is named Maud; the narrative begins in Boulogne and ends with a shipwreck on a desert island. Throughout, the book exhibits the author's inordinate fondness for puns. The reviews were universally harsh: The Graphic laments, "anything more thoroughly and hopelessly foolish has seldom or never come in our way." Gillmor died in 1886 in Bow.
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References: British Census (1841, 1851, 1871, 1881); Gentleman's Magazine (December 1855); Jackson's Oxford Journal (12 November 1870); Pall Mall Gazette (27 September 1886); pers inf (Judith Gardiner); Probate
Fiction Titles:
- Jessie of Boulogne: The History of a Few Minutes. 3 vol. London: Samuel Tinsley, 1876.