Author: Buckstone, John Baldwin
Biography:
BUCKSTONE, John Baldwin (1802-79: ODNB)
He was born on 14 Sept. 1802 in Hoxton, Middlesex, to John Buckstone, a retired grocer, and his wife Elizabeth Baldwin. They had married on 23 May 1801 when Elizabeth was still a minor. He was educated at Walworth grammar school before being articled to a solicitor. But he was drawn to acting and, from the age of nineteen, he worked in provincial theatres, earning a reputation for comic acting and meeting Edmund Kean who may have helped him secure a role at London’s Surrey theatre where he first performed in 1823. He became a member of the company at the Coburg theatre before moving to the Adelphi. Buckstone or “Bucky” began writing dramatic works in a broad range of genres—Billy Taylor, listed in this database, is an early work—which were successfully performed at the Adelphi and the Haymarket theatres. On 29 Mar. 1828 he married Anne Maria Honeyman (1807-44); they had at least three children. He was a popular actor, public speaker, and writer who also managed the Haymarket from 1853-76. He worked frequently with a well-known actor, Fanny Elizabeth Fitzwilliam (d 1854), and on 20 Aug. 1857 he married her young cousin, Isabella Copeland. They had children, three of whom became actors. Towards the end of his life he suffered from financial problems and he declared bankruptcy in 1878. He died, probably from a paralytic stroke, on 31 Oct. 1879 at his home, Bell Green Lodge in Lower Sydenham. (ODNB 13 July 2023; ancestry.co.uk 13 July 2023; findmypast.co.uk 13 July 2023) SR
Other Names:
- J. B. Buckstone