Author: Hey, Richard
Biography:
HEY, Richard (1745-1835: ODNB)
He was born on 11 Aug. 1745 at Pudsey, near Leeds, Yorkshire--a younger son in the large family of Richard Hey (1702-66), drysalter, and his wife Mary Simpson (1702-68), who had married in 1730. One elder brother, John Hey, DD, preceded him at Cambridge as a prizewinner and a Fellow of Sidney Sussex College, and another, William Hey, became a surgeon and the Mayor of Leeds. Richard matriculated at Magdalene College, Cambridge, in 1764 and had a distinguished record as a mathematician, graduating BA 1768 as Third Wrangler and winner of the Chancellor’s Gold Medal. He moved on to Sidney Sussex (Fellow and Tutor, MA 1771) and then returned to Magdalene as Fellow 1782-96. (He was also called to the bar in London in 1771 but never practiced.) In 1779 he was awarded an LLD by royal mandate. His literary work was varied; most successful in his time were three essays, on gambling, duelling, and suicide respectively, that won prizes at Cambridge in 1783-5 and were published collectively as Three Dissertations in 1812. In the 1790s he attempted a tragedy, listed here, and a novel, Edington (1796). On 4 May 1796 he married Martha Browne at North Mymms, Hertfordshire, and gave up his Cambridge fellowship. She was the daughter of Thomas Browne, Garter Principal King of Arms from 1774 to 1780. The couple settled at Hertingfordbury, near Hertford; there were no children. After his marriage Hey continued writing occasionally on political subjects and making contributions to scientific periodicals such as the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. He died at Hertingfordbury on 7 Dec. 1835 and was buried there the following day. His wife had predeceased him. (ODNB 30 May 2022; findmypast.com 30 May 2022; ancestry.com 30 May 2022; Sheffield Iris 8 Dec. 1835)