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Author: Potter, John

Biography:

POTTER, John (c. 1734-after 1813: ODNB)

It is not only his fairly common name that makes him difficult to identify with certainty. Early sources appear to contradict one another and later ones contain doubtful attributions. He was a clever but apparently temperamental man; financial hardship caused him to change location and occupation rather frequently. Baker (1812) is the principal authority for his early life and education. No record of his birth or baptism has been discovered but he is believed to have been born in London about 1734, son of Rev. John Potter, vicar of Cloford, Somerset, who wrote on mathematics and theology and may have contributed to his son’s schooling—but not for long since that John Potter died in 1739 (CCEd). He had a classical education and musical training. In Exeter in 1756 he established a weekly paper, the Devonshire Enquirer, the first of several journalistic ventures. In London in 1761 he lectured on music at Gresham College and published his lectures together with a proposal for establishing a national academy of music in 1762. He wrote both music and occasional texts for the London theatres from 1763, reviewed productions, and was employed regularly at Vauxhall Gardens as a song-writer until he quarreled with the proprietors in 1777. He also carried on a feud with his former patron, David Garrick (q.v.), which is reflected in his satire The Hobby-horse; and with the composer T. A. Fisher, for whose oratorio Providence (1777) Potter had written airs and choruses, and who is mocked in Musick in Mourning. Between 1769 and 1813 he published five novels. He was expelled from the Royal Society of Musicians in 1779 for non-payment of fees; went to the Continent to live more cheaply; and then in 1784 qualified as a physician with an Edinburgh MD degree and may have practised in Ireland. He seems not to have married. His name is associated with an address in Albemarle St., London, in 1803. His final novel, Olivia; or, The Nymph of the Valley by “John Potter MD” appeared in London in 1813 and was probably his last published work. His name does not appear in Watkins (1816). No reliable record of the date or place of death has yet been found. (ODNB 4 Nov. 2023; Baker; Highfill; ancestry.com 4 Nov. 2023; CCEd 4 Nov. 2023; EN 1, 2)

 

Books written (1):