Author: Pitman, Ambrose
Biography:
PITMAN, Ambrose (1758-1817: ancestry.co.uk)
He was born on 23 Mar. 1758 and baptised on 9 Apr. at St. Leonard’s, Shoreditch, London, the younger of two sons of Bartlett Pitman, of Gloucestershire, and his wife Ann Hallett, one of the coheiresses of Thomas Hallett of Bridport, Dorset. They had married at Winfrith Newburgh, Dorset, in 1745. He studied under the composer Thomas Arne from 1775 to 1778. He then retired to a country estate which an aunt had left him. In addition to the works listed here, he published The Beauties of Dominico Scarlatti (1788) and several musical works, mostly amorosos or love-songs for voice and piano-forte. He lived in Kent for several years and contributed to the Maidstone Journal under the signature Ephraim Epigram. He returned to London in 1795 and contributed to the European Magazine, including “Sonnet to the Nightingale” (March 1802, 209). He married Mary Dodd on 23 Oct. 1794 at St. George’s, Hanover Square. A daughter, Mary Ann, was baptised in the same church on 11 Apr. 1797. Watkins noted that she was still alive in 1816 and was also musical. His wife died on 10 June 1810 at Lisson Grove, London. He died in late Nov. 1817 and was buried at St. Marylebone on 7 Dec. (ancestry.co.uk 20 Feb. 2023; findmypast.co.uk 20 Feb. 2023; Public Ledger and Daily Advertiser 14 June 1815; Watkins, 275; GM June 1815, 572, Jan. 1816, 28-29; Monthly Magazine Jan. 1818, 563; John Nichols, Illustrations [1858], 8: 489) AA