Author: Pearson, Richard
Biography:
PEARSON, Richard (fl 1813)
He was “Richard Pearson, Jr.” in 1813 when he published his only book of poetry. It celebrates the military victories of Field Marshall and Marquis (later Duke of) Wellington between 1809 and 1813, and is dedicated to him; it is dated from London. Pearson explains that some of the poems had previously been published in newspapers but had been revised for the collection. A dismissive review in MR (“one of those whose zeal surpasses their talents”) surmises that the author is young and naïve. It seems in fact very likely that he was still a teenager, the son of Richard Pearson, MD (1764-1836), and his wife Elizabeth Startin, who had married in London on 17 Mar. 1794 and baptised Richard Jr. in Birmingham, Warwickshire, on 17 Mar. 1795. The father was at that time distinguished in his profession as Physician to the General Hospital, Birmingham. In 1800, however, he resigned and moved the family to London; they did not go back to Birmingham until 1815, by which time Richard Jr. was a student at St. John’s, Oxford (matric. 1815, BA 1818, MA 1821). He took orders in 1819 and was appointed curate at two Gloucestershire parishes which he had to leave not long after on account of illness: he published two of the sermons that he had preached there to express his gratitude to his parishioners. Thereafter he combined parish work with school-teaching, but he appears to have continued to struggle with ill health. On 29 Oct. 1822 he married Mary Greaves at Blatherwyke, Northamptonshire; they had at least four children, born at Maxey, near Stamford, Lincolnshire; at Tonbridge, Kent; and at Lowestoft, Suffolk, where they occupied a house with seven bedrooms and advertised “private tuition, with the advantages of Sea Air and Sea Bathing.” He died at Bath, Somerset, on 11 Aug. 1853; his wife Mary survived him and died also at Bath, aged 73, on 15 Jan. 1871. (ODNB [father] 7 Sept. 2023; ancestry.com 7 Sept. 2023; findmypast.com 7 Sept. 2023; CCEd 7 Sept. 2023; MR 72 [Nov. 1813], 323-4; GM 91 [1821], 619-20; MH 7 Dec. 1826; Bath Chronicle 19 Jan. 1871) HJ
Other Names:
- Richard Pearson, Jr.