Author: De La Voye, Marin J. George
Biography:
DE LA VOYE, Marin Joseph George (1796-1877: ancestry.com)
His origins are obscure but his career is well documented. In applications to the RLF towards the end of his life he gave his birth date as 1796 and a precise address at Cavendish Square, London. His family was Roman Catholic and French-speaking. He was a student at the University of Paris in 1813 and made his living thereafter as a “tutor” or “Professor of Modern Languages” and as an author, mostly in French. A sample of his works would include French-English dictionaries, grammars, short stories, and at least one novel in English (Eugenie, or, The Laundress of the Bastille, 1851). Most but not all of them were published in London. The response to his work in English was not encouraging: the reviewer for the Literary Gazette in 1832, for example, thought it was wasted effort to attempt “to engraft French taste upon English poetry.” From 1825 to 1845 he taught at the EIC Military College at Addiscombe, Surrey, and retired with a small pension, after which he took in pupils. On 30 June 1828 he married Eleanor Worgan at St. Pancras New Church, London; they had five children of whom three grew to maturity. In Mar. 1866 he made the first of seven applications to the RLF, which granted altogether £200 in the following ten years. He was declared bankrupt in 1867. Reasons given for the family’s distress (his wife and two daughters were dependent on him; the son was a cadet at Sandhurst and then joined the army) included his age and infirmity, the unexpected loss of students, and the erosion of his pension. At least one of the sponsors supporting his applications hinted at mental distress arising from thoughts about religion; he may have left the Church of Rome about 1873. He died at home in Kensington, London, aged 81, and was buried on 9 June 1877 at the Brompton Cemetery. (ancestry.com 29 Nov. 2023; findmypast.com 29 Nov. 2023; RLF #1694 [as De La Vove]; Morning Post 16 July 1828; Literary Gazette and Journal of Belles Lettres [1832], 281; MH 27 Feb. 1867)
Other Names:
- Marin De La Voye
- George Marin Delavoye
- Marin De La Voye
- Marin De La Voye
- Marin De La Voye