Author: Cherry, Andrew
Biography:
CHERRY, Andrew (1762-1812: findmypast.co.uk)
He was born on 11 Jan. 1762 in Limerick, Ireland, the eldest son of John Cherry, a printer, and his wife (her name is unknown). He was educated at a grammar school in Limerick before being apprenticed to James Potts, a printer and bookseller in Dame Street, Dublin, at the age of eleven. Potts introduced Cherry to the theatre and he first performed in a play when he was fourteen. A few years later he abandoned printing for a company of strolling players in Naas, County Kildare. He next joined the successful theatre company of Richard William Knipe. Knipe died in 1779; four years later in Belfast Cherry married his daughter, Maria. She was also an actor and together they had a large family. They both performed with various provincial theatres in England and Ireland, and Cherry acted with the Theatre Royal, Smock Alley, Dublin. He was engaged at Drury Lane, London, in 1802 and made his first appearance on the stage there on 25 Sept. 1802. He stayed with the company until 1807 when he moved to Monmouth, Wales, to manage a theatre. Cherry died in Monmouth of “a dropsy on the brain” on 12 Feb. 1812 and was buried at St. Mary’s church on 16 Feb. 1812. On 18 Mar. 1812 T. J. Dibdin (q.v.) applied to the RLF on behalf of Maria Cherry and her four children—two of whom were in poor health and unable to assist their mother. The RLF granted £15 but denied subsequent requests in 1820 on the grounds that the rules of the fund provided for helping widows and orphans only once. Maria Cherry died at home in Covent Garden, London, in Dec. 1836. Cherry wrote ten plays with most of these being both performed and published. The most enduringly popular was The Soldier’s Daughter, first acted at Drury Lane in 1804. (ODNB 17 Nov. 2023; findmypast.co.uk 17 Nov. 2023; D. E. Baker, Biographia Dramatica [1812]; GM 82 [1812], 294-95; Chester Chronicle 28 Feb. 1812; Morning Advertiser 8 Dec. 1836; RLF file 279) SR
Other Names:
- A. Cherry