Author: DALLAS, George
Biography:
DALLAS, George (1758-1833: ODNB)
pseudonym Emilly Brittle
He was the younger brother of Robert Dallas and father of Robert Charles Dallas (qq.v.). George Dallas was born in London on 6 Apr. 1758 to Robert Dallas, an insurance broker, and his wife Elizabeth Smith. He was baptised on 23 Apr. at a meeting of the Scottish Presbyterian church at Founders’ Hall in London. He attended Dr. Elphinston’s school in Kensington before being sent with his brother to be educated by the Rev. M. Chauvet in Geneva. When he was eighteen he travelled to Bengal with the EIC and it was in India that he published his pseudonymous The India Guide, modelled on The Bath Guide by Christopher Anstey (q.v.), to whom it is dedicated. Reviews indicate that the book must have made its way to Britain almost immediately. Dallas prospered with the EIC and was noticed by Warren Hastings who ensured that he rose quickly through the ranks, becoming a factor in 1782 and a junior merchant in 1785, shortly before he returned to England because of poor health. On 12 June 1788 he married Catherine Margaret Blackwood at St. Marylebone; she was the daughter of Sir John Blackwood of Killyleagh, Co. Down, Ireland. In 1793 he published Thoughts Upon our Present Situation, in vigorous opposition to the principles of the revolution in France. In the later 1790s he published a number of works on the Irish situation, including a series of letters signed “Civis” in The Anti-Jacobin. He was elected MP for Newport, Hampshire, on 8 May 1800 but lost his seat on 6 July 1802. The family moved to Devon because of his health and there he continued writing political pamphlets. Dallas retained a strong interest in India and was in demand for his expertise at debates in India House. He died at Brighton on 14 Jan. 1833 and was buried at St. Andrew’s, Brighton, where there is a memorial. His will, proved on 9 Feb. 1833, asked that his funeral be kept plain and inexpensive. It provided for his wife and his four surviving children. It also shows that Dallas had inherited both money and a share in plantations in Grenada from William Gemmell. Dallas left his manuscripts to his son, Robert Charles. (ODNB 8 June 2024; ancestry.co.uk 8 June 2024; LBS; historyofparliamentonline.org 8 June 2024) SR