Author: Clark, Charles
Biography:
CLARK, Charles (1806-80: ODNB)
He was the only child of Robert Clark, a farmer, and his wife Mary Ann Pond; his parents had married in Maldon, Essex, on 9 May 1804. Clark was baptised at St. Andrew’s, Heybridge, Essex, on 18 Nov. 1806, and was educated at James Salisbury Dunn’s school in Witham, Essex, before beginning work as a farmer with his father. In 1823 the family moved to Great Totham, Essex, where they lived in Great Totham Hall. Clark never married. In the 1820s he began writing verse and published in periodicals. He is listed as a landowner and farmer in census records but his main interest was in antiquarian books and a hand printing press which he operated at home. Beginning with Great Totham: A History, Antiquarian and Statistical (1831) which he wrote with George W. Johnson, his press issued limited editions of broadsheets and books. Clark specialised in reproductions of old books, including Mathew Hopkins’s The Discovery of Witches (1647; Clark’s reprint, 1837) and Thomas Tusser’s Hundreth Good Poyntes of Husbandrie (1557; Clark’s reprint, 1834). HIs Tiptree Races (1834) claims on the title page to be modelled after Thomas Hood's (q.v.) Epping Hunt (1829). He was encouraged by the London publisher and bookseller, John Russell Smith, for whom he seems to have sourced antiquarian books. The bibliography of his works is complicated by the existence of his printed works in different states and by his occasional use of pseudonyms including Doggrel Drydog. Later in life he moved back to Heybridge where he died of heart disease on 21 Mar. and was buried on 27 Mar. 1880. His estate was valued at under £500. (ODNB 8 Dec. 2023; ancestry.co.uk 8 Dec. 2023; Boase; CCEd 8 Dec. 2023 [for J. S. Dunn]; C. Griffin, G. Allen, M. O’Connell, Readings on Audience and Textual Materiality [2025]) SR
Other Names:
- C. C.