Author: Greswell, Richard
Biography:
GRESWELL, Richard (1800-81: ODNB)
He was born on 22 July 1800 and baptised on 14 Sept. at Christ Church, Denton, Lancashire, the fourth son of Rev. William Parr Greswell (q.v.), perpetual curate, and Ann(e) Yeardley, who had married in Manchester Cathedral in 1794. He was educated at Manchester Grammar School and Worcester College, Oxford (matric. 1818, Scholar 1818-24, BA 1822, MA 1825, BD 1836, Fellow 1824-37, Assistant Tutor 1822, Tutor 1825, Bursar 1826, Hon. Fellow 1878-81). He got a Double First in Classics and Mathematics. Four of his brothers also became Fellows at Oxford. He was ordained in the Church of England but remained without “cure of souls” at Worcester College for most of his life. He was one of the founders of the Ashmolean Club and read two papers to the Ashmolean Society, On Education in the Principles of Art (1844) and Memorial on the (Proposed) Oxford University Lecture-Rooms, Library, Museums, &c. (1853). He was a supporter of the Tractarian movement (although never of the turn to Catholicism) and was both active in and a generous patron of the National Society for the Education of the Children of the Poor in the Principles of the Established Church (for which he helped raise over £250,000) and later the Universities’ Mission to Central Africa. He married Joanna Julia Armetriding (1803-75), daughter of the Rev. James Armetriding, rector of Steeple Aston, Oxfordshire, and formerly Fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford, on 5 Apr. 1836 at St. Mary Magdalen, Oxford. She brought wealth to the marriage. They had two daughters, Joana Julia (1838-1906) and Helen Margaret (1840-1913), whose classical education he supervised, with Joana Julia publishing a widely-respected Grammatical Analysis of the Hebrew Psalter (1873). He died on 22 July 1881 at 39 St. Giles Street, leaving an estate of just over £21,000 to his two unmarried daughters with generous bequests to various Oxford institutions. He was buried at St. Mary Magdalen, Oxford, in the same grave as his wife Julia who had predeceased him in 1875. A memorial tablet to him was erected in his father’s church at Denton acknowledging his generous financial contributions. (ODNB 30 Sept. 2024; DNB; John William Burgon, Lives of Twelve Good Men [1888], 2: 93-121; ancestry.co.uk 30 Sept. 2024; findmypast.co.uk 30 Sept. 2024; CCEd 30 Sept. 2024; OUCH 9 Apr. 1836; LES 8 Feb. 1875; Pall Mall Gazette23 July 1881; Morning Post 29 July 1881) AA