Prepared by the late Eileen Curran, Emerita Professor of English, Colby College,
for the Victoria Research Web
The Wellesley Index to Victorian Periodicals names "some 12,000 authors" of articles in a mere forty-three monthlies and quarterlies (5:vii) and leaves many more unidentified. While some of the same writers reappear in the thousands of monthlies and quarterlies not indexed in Wellesley and of weeklies and annuals, those journals would provide thousands of additional authors. The majority of these contributors remain as unknown once we learn their names as they were as anonymous writers. One of the justifications for anonymous publication was that each article spoke with the authority of the journal, no matter how young and still unknown, or simply unknown, the writer might be. Accepting that argument would mean that we need only a "biography" of the journal--the publishing histories that in Wellesley precede tables of contents. Nevertheless our natural instinct is to ask who these obscure journalists were; we want to know what knowledge or experience lay behind the articles we read. Moreover, learning something about contributors means learning something about 19th-century journalism and literary life, in fact about life and literature then, separately as well as together.
The biographies that follow set a few of these obscure contributors before us in what limited detail can be discovered. They represent a mere drop in the bucket--or a small drop glancing off the bucket, a restricted view of the subject, since I began many of them when working on the Foreign Quarterly Review. Even those added since then often take us beyond the British Isles, for 19th-century Britain was never as insular as we fancy. Intellectual curiosity took people abroad, or commercial interests, or a lower cost of living, or need for material for the next book, or a search for health or for new gambling spots (German spas provided both), among many impetuses to travel.
Some of these now unknown men and women aspired to be among the stars; one finds disappointed, frustrated men who never achieved the glory, or even the simple success, they sought--who didn't get the jobs they wanted, whose articles weren't accepted by their periodicals of choice. Inadequate education, limited ability, lack of connections, lack of the time and freedom that money can provide--or lack, whatever the advantages, of sustained effort--all this one finds in these biographies. Others, again for a wide variety of reasons, recognized the minor role they played and were content with it--not for lack of ambition but with a clear-sighted pride in what they had done. Nor should we neglect the con men, the paranoid or otherwise delusional, those unfortunately addicted to alcohol or drugs. If a century and a half later few of these names are remembered, here are people who spoke to, sometimes for, their contemporaries. Some were prolific contributors to the periodical press; others claimed only a few minutes in the pulpit the press provided.
None of these people appear in the Dictionary of National Biography or in other national biographical dictionaries (Dictionary of American Biography, Dictionary of Canadian Biography, Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie or the not yet completed Neue Deutsche Biographie, etc.); a small number do receive brief entries in Boase's invaluable Modern English Biography. If a source is used in a single biography, bibliographical information appears there. Some sources (e.g., Carlyle's printed correspondence, various manuscript collections) yield information on more than one person dealt with here. For those I give identifying information on the first appearance, then use a brief tag; there will be a full bibliography at the end. There may be some inadvertent difficulties. For example, I give names of German libraries as they were when I corresponded with them in the 1960s; names, even locations of manuscript collections, may have changed. Some letters that I used in British manuscript collections have since been published; I try to cite publishing data but probably have missed a few.
Along the way I have received immense assistance from decades of reference and interlibrary loan staff at the Colby College Library and from librarians and archivists in several countries who have patiently checked their records and on occasion brought out boxes of yet uncatalogued material for me to examine. Microfilm, the computer and the internet have made it much easier to search from my desk in Maine but don't excite the same feeling as unavoidably breaking Leonard Horner's seal on the paper bands holding together applications for the first professorships at the new London University. (Once I finished with them, the letters, flecked with green and yellow and brown molds, were taken off to be fumigated. You can use them now in the University College Library, cleaned, deodorized, and numbered.)
-- E. C., Summer 2002
Update 2004: Fleming, Kater, Mackenzie, Moscati, de Sanctis, Wilberforce
As in the introduction to the earlier installment, I would call attention to the geographical sweep of these stories and to the struggles of these men--financial, spiritual, psychological. Two very different men are Italian emigres; another is second generation English from German stock, while a fourth lived in Germany for several years. Yet another, after filling diplomatic positions in the Caribbean area, came to a bad end in New York. Some went through sharp life (not limited to mid-life) crises, struggling to find a calling or at least an income, at times beginning brilliantly or with great promise before disappearing.Some of the sketches are shorter than they should be, some longer. Just trying to untangle the wild tales of the soi-disant Marquis di Moscati from the possible facts of his life, asking if he was more con man or more victim of British snobbery, has produced an unconscionably long sketch. At the other end, I regret the relative brevity of the sketch of Edward Wilberforce, who remains overshadowed by others in his well-known extended family--and whose long professional life as a barrister is scarcely touched upon here.
Generally I have identified periodicals but not individual articles if these can be found in readily available sources like The Wellesley Index to Victorian Periodicals and the on-line list of markings in the Athenaeum. As much as possible I have given the titles of articles in periodicals that have not been similarly indexed; occasionally I cite published bibliographies.
-- E. C., Winter 2004
Update 2011: Dauney, Devereux, Gordon, Grimes, Kirwan, Robinson, Smirnove
*Professor Curran died on April 22, 2013, at the age of 85. (An announcement, with a short tribute, can be found here.) This set of biographies will remain here as part of her distinguished scholarly legacy. It is hoped that eventually some of her notes for additional biographies will be published here, as well. Those with additions or corrections to this material may send them to webmaster [AT] victorianresaerch [DOT] org
Albizzi || Austin || Barker || Beckwith(-Lohmeyer || Belinaye || Bell || Dauney || Devereux || Fleming || Gordon || Grimes || Kater|| Kirwan || Mackenzie || Moscati || Robinson || de Sanctis || Smirnove || Wilberforce
The count was born in 1804 in Florence, Italy, son of Giuseppe Pietro Albizzi (1745-1827) and nephew of the Marquis Albizzi. A cavalry officer in the army of Charles X of France, he was wounded in Paris fighting against the insurgents of July 1830. Possibly he then returned, with a brother, to Florence; sources are unclear on his movements in the early 1830s. By January 1835 he was in London, where he sought an audience with Sir Robert Peel. He claimed acquaintance with several aristocratic and political figures, mainly correspondents of Antonio Panizzi, on the basis of having "been recommended to" some of them and "presented to" others. He may have been in England longer, or he was a quick wooer; in April 1835, at St.Mary-le-Strand church in London, he married Mary Sophia Haywood, daughter of Martin Haywood of London and Southey Hall (Francis Haywood was a close friend of Panizzi). They had 3 sons and 2 daughters, born between 1836 and 1846.
The Albizzis were living in Hay Park in 1836 but moved to Shrewsbury, where Albizzi taught French from 1838 (or perhaps earlier) through 1841. As far as we know, life was calm for a few years, disturbed by nothing more than a new baby every other year. Then the following story reached London (Times, 13 December 1841, p 5, col. c):
"LUDICROUS FRACAS. The Ten Towns Messenger reports proceedings before the Mayor of Shrewsbury, wherein Dr. Mackenzie, the editor of the Salopian Journal, and Count Albizzi, a French teacher, were the parties accused of a desperate fracas. The Salopian Journal had given offence to the Count by a severe critique on the performances of a young lady at the Shrewsbury musical festival. A violent paper war was carried on between them for some time, in which the most abusive epithets were exchanged. At length the Count waited on the editor to exchange blows. Dr. Mackenzie was knocked down, and the Count, placing his foot on his fallen enemy, commenced belabouring him with a stick. The editor then drew forth a pistol and threatened to shoot his assailant if he did not liberate him. The pistol was fortunately wrenched from his hand by a police officer before any mischief was done. The magistrates bound over both parties to keep the peace."
Presumably the publicity given this incident made it difficult for Albizzi to recruit new students in Shrewsbury. After returning to London, he tried to earn money as a writer, with limited success. The Rev. Joseph Edwards, a master at King's College School, London, recommended him to George Long, editor of the Biographical Dictionary projected by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge (SDUK). Albizzi wrote to Long (7 Feb. 1842) that he had "already furnished some articles to the foreign quarterly Review, the frazer Magazine &c &c." Some brief notices in the Foreign Quarterly at this time may be his, but a change of publishers late in 1841 already had that journal in turmoil. Nothing of his has been identified in Fraser"s, and I have been unable to trace the book on the French Revolution of 1830 that he claimed Saunders and Otley published. In April Albizzi did some research in the British Museum Reading Room (signed in by Panizzi, who was ever willing to assist Italian expatriates), and early in May he submitted several contributions for the Biographical Dictionary's first volume. Long rejected all of them, re-assigning the subjects to other writers.
By now he was probably desperate. A month or two later he entered into a conspiracy with Elzelina van Aylde Jonge, who called herself Mme. Ida Saint-Elme ("la Contemporaine"), proposing to sell the British government, through Lord Aberdeen (Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs), a collection of letters purportedly from and/or implicating Louis Philippe (who had supplanted Albizzi's old patron, Charles X of France) in plots against Great Britain. The asking price was L8,000 to L9,000, but Aberdeen did not bite, instead consulting Louis-Philippe, who unsurprisingly branded the letters forgeries. Whether they were or not, Albizzi had misplayed his hand and had no future in London. By 1846 he had returned to Florence, where he died on 6 July 1851. His two oldest sons died young, within the decade of his death. The other three children survived and married into Florentine professional and aristocratic circles. He was a member of the Alfred Club on Albemarle Street: an inexpensive club which John Timbs called "the asylum of doting tories and driveling quidnuncs" (Curiosities of London, 1867). Early in the century, the Alfred had welcomed exiles like Ugo Fosedo (Vincent 52).
An Ottavio degli Albizzi, perhaps this man, published Elementi di geologia e di mineralogia [of Tuscany] in Florence in 1851.
Sources: Count Pompeo Litta, Famiglie celebri Italiane 11 (Turin, 1876), disp. 178-180.
Gentleman's Magazine, June 1835, p. 654. (Litta calls him Rinaldo Ottavio, but Albizzi did not use Rinaldo in England. Rinaldo Ottavio and Ottavio may be safely identified as the same man by their marrying the same woman at the same time.) BL Add.Mss. 40412/244 (Albizzi to Peel); 43051/264-292 (Albizzi and others to and from Ld. Aberdeen). SDUK (Albizzi to Geo. Long, 7 Feb. 1842). BMRR
Born sometime after 1805, youngest son of Jonathan Austin of Creeting Mill, Suffolk. Brother of John and Charles Austin (see DNB) and brother-in-law of Sarah Taylor Austin. A linguist and Saxon scholar, he lived chiefly in Freiburg, Germany. "Said to be excessively shy," he had at least as serious a writers block as his brother John. In 1828 he proposed writing for the SDUK but their minutes do not indicate any submissions. He contributed to the Foreign Quarterly Review at least twice in the 1830s. In Sept. 1837 Gladstone �wrote to Mr G-- Austine,� but there seems no further mention of him. He may have died before 1846; his father�s will made in that year does not mention him.
Sources: Gladstone Diaries, 2:314. Hamburgers, 54, 235. Janet Ross, Three generations of Englishwomen (London, 1893), 89. UCL SDUK. BMRR.
There was only one Thomas C. Banfield, whose middle name was Collins; there was no Thomas Charles Banfield. Dates were 1802 - 1855. A lengthy biography will be posted at this site in the near future.
Charles Barker, who is not to be confused with Charles Edward Barker, was born in May 1797 in York, son of the Rev. Thomas Barker. One brother, Thomas, took a degree from Queens' College Cambridge and was a life-long vicar of Thirkleby, Yorks. Charles, however, declared that he did "not belong to the Church" and had "no view whatever to the Clerical profession."
He was educated at York Grammar School, then privately under the Rev. William Noddins, a Fellow of Magdalene College Cambridge living in York. In 1816 he entered Trinity College Cambridge, receiving his B.A. in 1821 and M.A. in 1824. In 1822 he won a £10 prize for the best essay on William III. "His habits were for the most part those of a recluse Student, and he indulged them to a degree which nothing but a robust and healthy constitution could have enabled him to bear" (Testimonials, 6). After his B.A. he continued to live at Trinity, taking private pupils. Sometime before 1824 he observed the monitorial system at Charterhouse, in what capacity is not clear. In Feb. 1824 he applied for the Classical Mastership at the new Edinburgh Academy; in March he changed this to an application for an English mastership. He was hired but dismissed after a year's trial. Urged by Leonard Horner to apply for the English Professorship at University College London in 1828, he instead applied for the History Professorship, then withdrew the application. Later periods would have called him manic-depressive or bi-polar; his letters describe alternating between intense exciteability "which sometimes elevates me to a pitch that I believe myself capable of everything, and at another, depresses me so low that I fancy myself worth nothing, and, what is worse, that there is nothing in the world worth anything."
His family was said to be literary and artistic. A brother contributed to Punch. A sister, Anne Elizabeth (Nancy; born 1790), in 1811, against the wishes of both families, married T. Perronet Thompson, who later edited the Westminster Review. With another brother-in-law, Henry Southern, Barker shared the Westminster's literary reviewing from 1824 to 1832; John Bowring claimed that Barker "was the critic of a large portion of the light literature noticed in the Westminster," though Wellesley identifies only one collaboration and one possible review, both in 1826. Barker also contributed to the London Magazine in 1825-26, when Southern edited it, and helped Southern edit the last series of the Retrospective Review (1827-28), for which he also wrote. He contributed to the Spectator from its start in 1828 at least through 1830 (including "The Three Days at Paris. By an Eye Witness,(3:7 Aug. 1830: 585-7); to the Foreign Quarterly Review in 1829; possibly to SDUK publications. Little of his apparently voluminous work has been identified.
He lived in Paris in 1830 and 1833, the last we hear of him. In 1853 two of his Retrospectivearticles were republished posthumously as Characters and Anecdotes of Charles the Second; the anonymous editor wrote that he was printing them "for readers of another generation." John Bowring said that Barker died young, choking on an ear of barley.
Sources: Testimonials in favour of Charles Barker, as a Candidate for the Situation of English Master in Edinburgh Academy; Additional Testimonials. Both Edinburgh, 1824.
"Editor's Preface," Barker's Character and Anecdotes of Charles the Second. London, 1853.
John Bowring. Autobiographical Recollections. London, 1877. 72-3.
L[eonard] G[eorge] Johnson. General T. Perronet Thompson 1783-1869: His military, literary and political campaigns. London, 1957. 163-4, 188.
George L. Nesbitt. Benthamite Reviewing: The first twelve years of the Westminster Review, 1824-1836. NY, 1934. 26.
Frank P. Riga and Claude A. Prance. Index to The London Magazine. NY: Garland, 1978. 128, 130.
Venn, Pt. II, 1:150.
Ms. letters to R. Maugham, 23 Apr. 1829; Leonard Horner, 31 Jan., 15 June, and 14 Oct., all 1828. SDUK, Brougham Papers, and College Corresp., all UCL.
Wellesley.
Beckwith was born in London in 1810; the son of Charles William Lohmeyer (born in England 1769/1770; died in Copenhagen 1855). His brother, John Henry (Beckwith-) Lohmeyer, was an employee in London of the publisher Richard Bentley. Charles worked in Copenhagen as a civil engineer and teacher of English. In Denmark he published schoolbooks and translations from English; in England Bentley published his translations from Danish, mainly of Hans Christian Andersen.
Confusion piles upon confusion. Both Charles and John Henry are referred to at times as Beckwith, at times as Lohmeyer, and at times as Beckwith-Lohmeyer, with no consistency even in a close associate's usage. Sometimes it seems that when they weren't Beckwith-Lohmeyer, Charles was Beckwith and John Henry was Lohmeyer, but then Mr. Beckwith turns out to be John Henry and Mr. Lohmeyer Charles. A safer rule, at least for the 1840s and 1850s: if he is in England, whatever he is called, he's John Henry; if in Denmark, Charles. Bentley's factotum who met Hans Christian Andersen on the latter's first visit to England in 1847 and before long annoyed Andersen ("He digs in and is so piteous"--Diaries 175), though referred to as Mr. Beckwith, is John Henry, not Charles as Wullschlager calls him (309); the same man signed as John Henry Lohmeyer when he received payment for Charles Beckwith's translations from Andersen, who referred to his translator as Mr. Lohmeyer.
Bibliographies and library catalogues further confuse matters. The mistaken identification of Charles Beckwith and Charles Boner is dealt with below. The Library of Congress catalogue conflates Charles Beckwith Lohmeyer and John Charles Beckwith (born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in 1789; in Denmark as an army officer between 1805 and 1808; served in the Peninsula, lost a leg at Waterloo; lived chiefly in the Vaudois valley in Piedmont 1827 to his death in 1862). Assisting that confusion, John Charles apparently did not use "John"; the DNB calls him Charles Beckwith after its initial use of the full name; and he would be the "Lieut. Col. Chas. Beckwith" admitted to the British Museum Reading Room in July 1830. Interestingly, the mother of John Charles was a sister of William Otis Haliburton, therefore an aunt of Thomas Chandler Haliburton, the creator of Sam Slick and a contributor to Bentley's Miscellany. With both Beckwith-Lohmeyers also employed by Bentley, there may be a family connection.
But to return to Charles Beckwith. He married Amalie Stahl, daughter of J. V. C. Stahl (connected with the Royal Theater) and Aue Catherine Sadoline née Middleton. With his wife, Beckwith kept a girls' school at Nörregade, Copenhagen. When in 1846 Andersen began to plan a visit to England, he turned to Beckwith for English lessons, which began at the end of 1846 and continued into 1847. Beckwith always presented himself as a close friend of Andersen, and indeed Andersen allowed Beckwith to publish some of his translations in England before the original Danish was published at home. Nevertheless the relationship was often strained, and Andersen could not ignore the criticism he heard of Beckwith's ability as a translator. Beckwith died [in Denmark?] in 1874.
Contributed to Bentley's Miscellany, Literary Gazette, Athenaeum.
Translated: 1. Claude og Pauline, eller Kjörlighed og Stolthed. The Lady of Lyons, or Love and Pride, Skuespil af E. L. Bulwer. Copenhagen, 1843.
2. Hans Christian Andersen. A poet's bazaar. 3 vols. London: Bentley, 1846. "Biography of Hans Christian Andersen," 1:1-27, is by Beckwith.
3. H. C. Andersen. A Christmas greeting to my English friends. London: Bentley, 1847. This translation appeared before the work's Danish publication. [Bredsdorff's Danish lit in Eng. trans. and Erslew both assign the translation to Charles Boner; in fact, Erslew Suppl., 1:22-23, considers "Charles Boner" a pseudonym used by C. Beckwith-Lohmeyer; he also attributes to Beckwith translations actually by Boner. The British Library and Wullschlager assign Christmas greeting to Beckwith; Bentley Receipts 51/281 shows that Lohmeyer collected payment for Beckwith's articles in Bentley's Miscellany and for "The Shadow" & "The Old Street Lamp" used in "Christmas Greeting."]
4. H. C. Andersen. The two baronesses. A romance in three parts. 2 vols. London: Bentley, 1848. Publ. before the work's Danish publication.
5. H. C. Andersen. Rambles in the romantic regions of the Hartz Mountains, Saxon Switzerland, &c. London: Bentley, 1848. "With the author's sanction." Several footnotes signed "Translator." Rambles takes up pp. 1-105, 117-251. Pp. 255-294, "Albert Thorvaldsen; A biographical sketch," reprint work by Andersen transl. by Beckwith and previously publ. in Bentley's Miscellany.. Pp. 106-116, "Saint Christopher, A Catholic legend," are not by Andersen but author not identified. Rambles the first translation into English of Andersen's travel books (Bredsdorff, Danish lit. in Eng., 177).
6. H. C. Andersen. Pictures of Sweden. London: Bentley, 1851. Notes by the translator.
Published: Verbal distinctions. Et Tillög til engelske Löseböger, Copenhagen, 1861.
For other English-Danish textbooks, published in Copenhagen between 1844 and 1851, see Erslew Suppl., 2:238.
Sources: The diaries of Hans Christian Andersen, selected and transl. by Patricia L. Conroy and Sven H. Rossel. Univ.Washington P, 1990.
Elias Bredsdorff. H. C. Andersen og England. Copenhagen, 1954.
-----. Danish literature in English translation, with a special Hans Christian Andersen supplement. A bibliography. Copenhagen, 1950.
Thomas Hansen Erslew. Almindeligt Forfatter-Lexicon for Kongeriget Danmark med tilhörende Bilande, fra 1814 til 1840. Copenhagen, 1847.
-----.Supplement til "Almindeligt Forfatter-Lexicon for Kongeriget Danmark med tilhörende Bilande, indtil Udgangen af Aaret 1853. 2 vols. Copenhagen, 1858, 1860.
Jackie Wullschlager. Hans Christian Andersen. The life of a storyteller. N.Y.: Knopf, 2001. Ignores John Henry and mistakenly considers all references to Beckwith or Lohmeyer to mean Charles.
BLPC. Bentley Archives, BL. Athenaeum index. Wellesley.
Born 19 Nov. 1799, in London, the younger son and third of four children of the Marquis Armand Marie de la Belinaye (d. 1836) by his wife Marie Louise Julia (1771-1859), Breton aristocrats who emigrated at the time of French Revolution. Parents were married in a Roman Catholic chapel in London and later re-married in a civil service in Paris, 15 Aug. 1821. His older sister, Mary, married Charles Philippe Auguste, Marquis de Grimaldi.
He and his older brother Armand were educated in part at the French Academy, Penn, near Beaconsfield, Bucks. He qualified as a surgeon, had a Harley Street practice from 1823 to 1842, and served as physician to the French, Austrian, and Russian Embassies, as Physician Extraordinaire to the Duchess of Kent, and as surgeon to an Italian troupe of opera singers which included Giulia Grisi. During this time he dropped his title, resuming it after 1842 when he closed his medical practice. (In Oct. 1836 he received a ticket of admission to the British Museum Reading Room as "Henry Belinaye, Esq.") He lived at 17 George Street, Hanover Square; later in Fulham; married before 1840; was widowed before May 1847, when he married Miss Sarah Maunch. By the first marriage he had at least one daughter, Evelina Anne, who in 1858 married Thomas Lance. At some point Belinaye moved to Florence, Italy, where he died on 10 Jan. 1873.
Contributed to the Foreign Quarterly Review and probably to medical journals.
Published: medical texts: On the removal of stones from the bladder (London 1825); The sources of health and disease in communities (London, 1832); Compendium of lithotripsy (London 1837).
Sources: BL Add.Ms. 47,494; Royal College of Surgeons registers; SDUK; BMRR. [Julia C. Byrne]. Gossip of the century. London: Ward & Downey, 1892. 2:115.
A banker and journalist, Bell was born in 1806, in Nassau, Bahamas, the eldest son of Robert Bell of Nassau. He was educated chiefly in Scotland, then studied law for 4 years. In 1831 he married Agnes Tod of Stornoway, who died in 1838; in 1850 he married Mary Anne Reaston, daughter of John Reaston of Duffield, Yorks. In 1840 he was said to have 14 years' experience in joint-stock banking in Scotland and England. If true, banking must have been his day job while he aspired to a different role. In the 1830s he published literary and philosophical books: The Literary Album (Glasgow, 1829); Universal Mechanism; as consistent with the creation of all things (Glasgow, 1830); The Scottish Martyr: the Rev. Richard Cameron (Edinburgh, 1833; repr. 1842); Life of Donald Cargill (Glasgow, 1836). In the early 1840s he made his living as a writer and journalist while trying to find other, non-literary employment. In quick succession he published books on banking questions: Philosophy of Joint-Stock Banking (London, 1840; repr. 1855), some chapters previously published in the "metropolitan press"; Country Banks and the Currency (London, 1842); Banker's and Merchant's Pocket Guide (Glasgow, 1843; rev. ed. London 1856). He edited the Great Northern Advertiser of Newcastle upon Tyne, perhaps for most of its run, 24 Dec. 1840 - 23 Nov. 1843 (but not for its continuation as the Newcastle Advertiser) and edited or co-edited the new Railway Herald (17 Apr. 1843-10 Apr. 1847; the length of Bell's tenure is unknown); contributed to the short-lived Cerberus (17 June - 18 Nov. 1843) and from July 1843 through Jan. 1846 to the Foreign and Colonial / New Quarterly Review. He may have been introduced to the last-named periodical by William Ewart Gladstone, then at the Board of Trade, who was closely connected with the Foreign and Colonial from its start and to whom Bell, writing from Newcastle upon Tyne in May and June 1843, had offered his services. Not required at the Board, Gladstone replied, and Bell remained a journalist. In mid-February 1844 Bell wrote again to Gladstone in search of a job, again unsuccessfully. He continued writing for periodicals to which he had already contributed and began to contribute to the new Banker's Magazine (first published in 1844). In 1846 he published A Guide to the Investment of Capital; or, How to lay out money with safety and profit. Being a popular exposition of the various descriptions of securities, with hints for the guidance of capitalists (London: C. Mitchell).
He wrote the weekly leading article in the Banking department of the Atlas for "upwards of three years" and contributed to theWestminster Review (no articles identified) and to unnamed metropolitan and provincial newspapers. Gradually he also returned to early interests, contributing to the Journal of Sacred Literature, which John Kitto started in 1848, as well as to Kitto's Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature. He also listed among the periodicals for which he wrote Hunt's New York Magazine. In the 1850s he served as secretary of the London Chartered Bank of Australia. No date of death has been found; the last record dates from 1856.
Sources: "Dictionary of Living Authors,"The Critic 12 (l July 1853), 358 [these biographies were written by their subjects]. Gladstone letter registers, BL Add. Mss. 44,554 - 44,555. Prefaces to his published books.
William Dauney (1800-1843), Scottish advocate, colonial administrator, and music historian, was born in Aberdeen on 27 Oct. 1800, the son of William Dauney of Falmouth, Jamaica. He was subsequently adopted by his childless uncle Alexander Dauney (1749-1833), LL.D., Professor of Law at King's College, Universsity of Aberdeen; Dr. Dauney's wife, Margaret (1751/52-1831) was a daughter of the Rev. Robert Pollock, Principal and Professor of Divinity at Marischal College University of Aberdeen.Educated at Dulwich College, London, and the University of Edinburgh, Dauney was called to the Scottish Bar on 13 June 1823. He is best known as a music critic and as an historian and archaeologist of Scottish music. In 1831-32 he served on a three-man committee to investigate and organize the music literature in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh. There he discovered the Skene Ms., which he published as Ancient Scottish Melodies (Edinburgh, 1838); to this he added a 'Dissertation Illustrative of the History of the Music of Scotland.' The work shows what are probably the earliest versions of many Scottish tunes. He was a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland and contributed to the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society and to the Foreign Quarterly and the Edinburgh Review, always on musical subjects.
Shortly after 1838 Dauney went to Demerara as Solicitor-General for British Guiana. He died in Georgetown, Demerara, on 28 July 1843. He was survived by his wife, Margaret (c.1800-1874) and by Alexander Dauney, born in London in 1833, the elder of their two sons, a barrister of the Middle Temple.