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Author: Feilding, Charles John

Biography:

FEILDING, Charles John (1761-88: Warwickshire Poets)

He was born at Monks Kirby, Warwickshire, the younger son of Basil Feilding, 6th Earl of Denbigh (1719-1800), and his first wife Mary Cotton. His elder brother William (1760-99) predeceased their father and the title went to his son William (1796-1865). Charles John attended Harrow and Trinity College Cambridge (matric. 1780, MA 1782); The Brothers, his only publication, was an undergraduate production praised by the Monthly Reviewfor its display of fraternal affection. He then set out on his travels and according to Poole's Warwickshire Poets was assassinated by his valet in Sept. 1788 in either France or Portugal. Newspaper reports are silent about the cause of death, however; the only confirmation of this date is the will of Charles John Feilding proved at the Consistory Court of Canterbury in Feb. 1789 for an overseas death. ACAD suggests that he lived until 1859 but admits that he died abroad, unmarried. Among his MS remains were a 72-page notebook of poems written 1773-7 last sighted in 1923 and an elegy on Garrick (d 1779) now held in a collection at the Folger Library. (Warwickshire Poets 177-83; findmypast.com 15 Jul. 2021; ACAD; Russell Markland, N&Q Jun. 1923, 510-11; Monthly Review 65 [1781] 468)

 

Books written (1):

London/ Cambridge/ Bath: J. Walter/ Mr. Merrill/ Mr. Crutwell, 1781