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Author: Dobbs, Francis

Biography:

Dobbs, Francis (1750-1811: WBIS)

Born in Lisburn, Co. Antrim, the son of a Church of Ireland clergyman, Richard Dobbs, and his wife Mary (Young) McManus, Dobbs became in turn a soldier, a barrister, a writer, and a politician known for his opposition to union with Great Britain. After serving as an officer in the army from 1768 to 1773, he entered the Middle Temple to study law. His play, The Patriot King; or, Irish Chief. A Tragedy was performed and published in Dublin in 1774. In 1775, he married Jane Stewart, with whom he would have seven children, and in the same year was called to the Irish bar. As he carried on a career as a barrister, he also took an active part in Irish politics and served as an officer with the Ulster volunteers. In the late 1780s, his interest in millennialism was reflected both in his poetry and in a multi-volume prose enterprise, the Universal History . . . in Letters from a Father to his Son. In 1797, he was elected to the Irish House of Commons and made some notable speeches, but he was on the losing side in the debate about Union (1801) and his later life was shadowed by failure, debt, and mental illness. (ODNB 14 Sept. 2018)

 

Books written (8):

London: Griffin, 1773
Dublin: Sleater, Williams, Husband, Walker, Jenkin, and Hillary, 1775
Dublin: [no publisher: "for the Author"], 1787
Dublin: printed by Chambers, 1788
Dublin: [no publisher], 1794