Author: Jenkins, Mr.
Biography:
JENKINS, William Kinnaird (1779-1850: ancestry.com)
Born in Scotland, he was the eldest son of George Jenkins (1740-1798), an author, musician, and dancing master who specialized in Scottish dance, and his wife, Elizabeth Powell of Raglan, Monmouth (married 1775). His parents were members of the Countess of Huntingdon’s Connexion. On 6 Apr. 1792, he was apprenticed to dancing master Colin Macrae. At the end of his apprenticeship, he was admitted by patrimony into the Freedom of the City of London, in July 1799. Building on his father’s success as dancing master to wealthy patrons, in 1801 he was appointed dancing instructor to princess Charlotte, in 1827 to princess Victoria. On 15 Nov. 1813 at St Mary, Westminster, he married Henrietta Carolina Hempel (1781-1840). A sister of noted organist Charles William Hempel, she was the widow of James Hance of Kingston, Jamaica (married 1811), who left nothing to her in his will. There were three boys and two girls by William and Henrietta’s marriage. In 1826, he moved his business from 19 Devonshire Street, Portland Place (leased as early as 1811), to 4 Harley Place, Devonshire Place. Between 1811 and 1842, he had a private office in a business building in Regent’s Park, 24 Nottingham Place. His career as dancing master to aristocrats and the upper gentry was extremely lucrative. In 1821 or earlier he purchased Fairlie House, an elegant residence at 32 Upper Avenue Road, Regent’s Park. In 1830, he threw open the grounds of Fairlie House for a charity bazaar patronized by the duchesses Cumberland, Kent, and Gloucester. In 1834, he entered his horse, “Dancing Master,” in the Wells Races. He died at his Regent’s Park residence on 25 Aug. 1850. (ancestry.com 7 Nov. 2023; PROB 11/1303; PROB 11/2124; Morning Post, 27 Aug. 1801; Oxford University and City Herald, 20 Nov. 1813; Evening Mail, 24 July 1820; Star, 20 July 1821; Morning Chronicle, 3 Nov. 1826; Boyles’ Fashionable Court and Country Guide [1817], 280, and [1829], 380; Morning Herald, 20 July 1830; Dublin Evening Packet, 3 Apr. 1834; Public Ledger, 5 July 1834; Morning Advertiser, 4 Sep. 1850; GM 48 [1840], 522; Highfill 8: 153) JC
Other Names:
- Mr. Jenkins