Author: Harrison, William Henry
Biography:
HARRISON, William Henry (1795-1878: ancestry.com)
The son of Elizabeth (Foy) and John Harrison, he was born at Lambeth, London, in 1795 and baptised there, but not until 7 Feb. 1808. He was probably apprenticed to his father, who had a business as a gilder and carver on Bow Street, Covent Garden—the business listed under the son’s name by 1841--but he was also a versatile writer who turned his talent to prose, poetry, journalism, and editing, and contributed to many publishers’ projects, especially in the 1830s when Ackermann and others popularised literary annuals and gift books. He was a friend and editor of John Ruskin (1819-1900) in the 1840s. On 9 Mar. 1822 he married Mary (or Mary Ann) Dale at St. George’s, Hanover Square; the couple had at least three children and settled in Chelsea. In later census reports he identifies himself as a “carver and gilder” (1851, 1871) or else as a “dealer in paintings” (1861). There is, confusingly, another William Henry Harrison (1841-97) who contributed prose and verse to magazines and periodically collected the results; he specialised in science, photography, and spiritualism and had business premises at 38 Great Russell Street, London; but Harrison of Chelsea was certainly the author of the works listed here, as well as of Tales of a Physician (2 series 1829, 1831), Christmas Tales (1840), and The Fossil Bride and Other Verses (1868). He died at his home, 19 Beaufort St., on 5 Mar. 1878 and was buried at the West Brompton cemetery on 11 Mar. (ancestry.com 23 Dec. 2024; findmypast.com 23 Dec. 2024; Boase 1: 2089; Post Office Directory 1841; Western Morning News [Plymouth] 29 Mar. 1878) HJ
Other Names:
- W. H. Harrison