Author: GREENWOOD, William
Biography:
GREENWOOD, William (1788-1842: ancestry.co.uk)
He was born on 6 July 1788 and baptised on 10 Aug. at Sheffield Cathedral, the second of five children of David Greenwood (1765-98), schoolmaster, and Jennet Senior (1767-1852), who had married at Cawthorne, near Barnsley, Yorkshire, in 1786. He trained at William Vint’s (1768-1834) dissenting academy at Idle Presbyterian chapel, near Bradford, and became the first minster at the newly established Independent/Congregationalist chapel at Saville Street, Malton, Yorkshire, from 1815 until his resignation in 1827. From 1829 to 1833 he was a dissenting minister at Torquay but he conformed and was ordained by the Bishop of Exeter in June 1833, taking half his congregation with him. He underwent bankruptcy proceedings at Exeter (London Gazette 8 July 1836). Thereafter he moved to Wales where he settled at Newchurch, Radnorshire, and is recorded in the 1841 census at the rectory, living with his third wife and a daughter, Jennet, from his first marriage. He had married first Martha Croft (1798-1829) on 23 Apr. 1813 at St. James’s, Bradford (Bradford Cathedral). They had at least seven children and she probably died due to childbirth complications. He then married Eliza Heywood (1802-37) on 9 Mar. 1830, at Ramsbury, Wiltshire, with no further issue. After her death, he married Eliza Maria Jones (1804-1890) on 26 Feb. 1838 at St. Mary’s, Pembroke, with no further issue. He died at the rectory, Newchurch, Radnorshire, south Wales, on 11 July 1842, and was buried on 16 July. The Vale of Apperley contains a long four-part religious topographical title poem and similar verse on other Yorkshire topographical landmarks such as Castle Howard, Bincliff Hall, Malham Cove, and the Yorkshire Wolds. His only other known publication was a Memoir (1827) of the life of the Congregational minister George Sykes (1761-1826) of Rillington, Yorkshire. (ancestry.co.uk 28 Jan. 2024; findmypast.co.uk 28 Jan. 2024; Bath Chronicle 18 Mar. 1830; British Magazine June 1833, 744; John Reece, The Necessity of Divine Revelation . . . Together with some Account of the Life and Last Dying Sentiments of Mr. David Greenwood, Schoolmaster . . . [Sheffield 1798], [3]-11; GRO death cert.) AA
Other Names:
- W. Greenwood