Author: Hall, James
Biography:
HALL, James (c. 1755-c. 1821: ancestry.com)
With such a common name, such an unconventional career, and so few reliable public records, Hall has invited false connections. He was not the Edinburgh baronet (1761-1832) nor a member of his family; nor was he the Rev. James Hall, DD (1755-1826). The most reliable evidence comes from his own title-pages, with their display of his works, honours, and credentials. Hints to the Inhabitants of . . . Rowington and Baddesley Clinton (2nd edn. 1819), for example, refers to an earlier edition (c. 1817) of Cottage Poems of which no copy has been found. He was indisputably a Scottish clergyman, author of Travels in Scotland (1807) and A Tour through Ireland (1813). According to CCEd, he was born in Clackmannan. If so, he may have been born on 8 Nov. 1755--although CCEd gives 8 Nov. 1757--to Margaret (Duncan) and John Hall. Records of the Marischal College, Aberdeen, which awarded him an honorary AM in 1786, indicate that he attended school in Aberlour. ESTC includes early publications (for sale in Clackmannan) that identify him as an assistant preacher at Ordequhill and minister at Lesmahagow in 1793. He is probably the James Hall who married Jean Russell at Clackmannan in 1794 and had at least three children born in Scotland. In the 1790s he published several sermons and pamphlets in Glasgow and London, obviously hoping for preferment, and eventually attracted the notice of the Earl of Caithness, to whom he served as chaplain and whose patronage he highlights on later title-pages. He was a man of wide-reaching curiosity and a bit of a chancer. From about 1805 to 1811 he lived in Walthamstow and taught at a school there; it was at this time that he took out a patent for a process for using sticks instead of hemp and conducted his research into freezing (Remarks and Experiments, 2nd edn. 1819), besides publishing his first book of travels. His fortunes improved after he was ordained in England in 1814 at the age of almost 60 and secured several livings in the north of England, the most important being Vicar of Rowington, Warwickshire (from 13 May 1819). Despite his writer's itch, he published nothing new after 1819 and he most probably died about then. He might, as Ed Pope suggests, have been the clergyman of that name who died at Warwick in Oct. 1821, aged 68 (b c. 1753), curate of Radford Semele, but that position is not recorded by CCEd. (ancestry.com 24 Dec. 2021; findmypast.com 24 Dec. 2021; CCEd 24 Dec. 2021; WorldCat; ESTC; Fasti Academicae Marischallianae Aberdonensis [1889-98] 1: 366; edpopehistory.co.uk; Christian Remembrancer 3 [1821], 703)
Other Names:
- the Rev. James Hall, A.M.