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Author: Roscoe, William

Biography:

ROSCOE, William (1753-1831: ODNB)

Roscoe's father William, who had been the butler at Allerton Hall near Liverpool, was an innkeeper on Mount Pleasant in Liverpool by the time his son was born; he later added market gardening to his business interests. His mother Elizabeth (Stevenson) Roscoe encouraged the young William's love of literature. He left school at twelve to work with his father and then at fifteen was articled to a solicitor, but he kept up his independent reading and joined a reading club with other young men during his apprenticeship. At this time he became a founding member of a Society for the Encouragement of the Arts in Liverpool. In 1774 he was admitted as an attorney and became partner in a lucrative law practice for over 20 years. He married Jane Griffies in 1781; they raised a family of ten children, several of whom became writers, including three poets, Robert Roscoe, Jane Elizabeth Roscoe and Mary Anne Jevons (qq.v.). Roscoe retired from the law firm at the age of 43 and shortly after purchased Allerton Hall as a home for his retirement. About the same time, he became a shareholder to support a banker friend and was persuaded to become a partner in the bank. Roscoe's greatest successes as a writer were as a historian (The Life of Lorenzo de' Medici, 1796, and The Life and Pontificate of Leo the Tenth, 1805) and as a writer for small children, notably with The Butterfly's Ball of 1807. But he was a Unitarian and a liberal, and the work that probably meant the most to him was his activity as a social and political reformer, especially his contributions to the campaign against the slave trade. In 1806 he was elected MP for Liverpool, but after the vote in favour of abolition in 1807 there was unrest in his constituency and he did not stand again. His bank failed in 1816; Roscoe sold off Allerton Hall and his fine collections of books and art, but was nevertheless declared bankrupt in 1820. A successful appeal saved part of his collection of early Italian and northern European paintings to be presented to the Liverpool Royal Institution (of which Roscoe had been co-founder in 1817). Roscoe was awarded a pension of £300 p.a. for services to literature and continued to write, though his edition of Pope's works, with a life and notes (10 vols. 1824) attracted controversy. His wife Jane died shortly after they moved into their final home in Lodge Lane, Liverpool, but their youngest daughter stayed on to look after her father for the rest of his life. (ODNB 7 Aug. 2020; "Roscoe, William," historyofparliamentonline.org 7 Aug. 2020)

 

Other Names:

  • Mr. Roscoe
  • W. Roscoe
  • Mr. [William] Roscoe
  • Roscoe
 

Books written (21):

Philadelphia: printed by Joseph James, 1788
London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, and J. Harris, [1809]
Philadelphia: B. and T. Kite, 1810
New York: D. Longworth and D. W. Smith, 1816
London: Dean and Munday and A. K. Newman and Co., [1825?]
London: Dean and Munday, [1830?]