Author: Atkins, Henry
Biography:
ATKINS, Henry (1775-1842: ancestry.co.uk)
He was baptised on 10 July 1775 at Wykeham, Hants., the son of Samuel Atkins and his wife Henrietta Brady, who had married in St. George’s, Hanover Square, Westminster, on 6 Oct. 1774. He went to Winchester College and New College, Oxford (matric. 1793, BA 1796, MA 1800) and then entered the church. At Oxford he won the 1796 Latin Prize for his poem, later translated by Nicholas Lee Torre (q.v.) in 1831 as The Establishment of Colonies on the Western Coast of Africa (not long enough to be included in this bibliography). The Latin text was reprinted in the third edition of The Isle of Wight (1837) which also contained another poem written at Oxford, "The Muse" (1800), and the topographical poem "Written in the Album at Capel Curig, Cwm Idwal, North Wales." He married Harriet Chandler on 17 Dec. 1801 at St. Marylebone, Westminster. She was the sister of the Rev. George Chandler, later Dean of Chichester, and her extensive church connections probably furthered her husband’s career. He does, not, however, appear to have been particularly, ambitious. An only daughter, Henrietta, was born in 1803. He became Vicar of Arreton, Isle of Wight, in 1815 and was later Prebendary of Wightering in Chichester cathedral. At the time of his death he was also minister at Saint Bartholomew, Chichester. His wife died on 8 Dec. 1834 and was buried at Shedfield, Hants. He died at the house of his brother-in-law, the Rev. Thomas Whipham (who had married his sister Frances in 1805), at Vicar’s Hill, Kingsteignton, Devon, and requested he be buried next to his wife at Shedfield. He also published A Sermon (1825) on "The Present Intellectual Advancement of the Labouring Classes" in support of a national system of education. He preached "A Series of Theological Lectures" (1842) in Chichester Cathedral which were left unfinished at his death. (ancestry.co.uk 30 Oct. 2021; findmypast.co.uk 30 Oct. 2021; Hampshire Advertiser 20 Dec. 1834; GM Dec. Supp. 1801, 1210, Dec. 1842, 670) AA