Author: Sharp, Richard
Biography:
SHARP, Richard (1759-1835: ODNB)
Sharp was not primarily a writer but a wealthy businessman with an extraordinarily large and diverse network of friends. He was born in the British garrison of St. John's in Newfoundland while his father Richard (1737-65) was an officer stationed there; his mother Elizabeth (Adams) Sharp was a Newfoundlander. After they returned to London, his father died and his mother married Thomas Cable Davis, who was a partner in the Sharp family business of hat-making in a property on Fish Street Hill. There Sharp grew up with his brother William and step-siblings, their parents, and his paternal grandfather. He did not attend university--the Sharps were dissenters--but he was tutored by a classical scholar, the Rev. John Fell. After serving his apprenticeship, he took over the business. He later became a partner in a West India firm, prospered, and bought a house on Park Lane. Other members of the household were William Sharp and his wife Anna and, from about 1813, Maria Kinnaird, the young ward of both brothers. Sharp did not marry but enjoyed a busy social life at home and in his country retreats; in the best Whig circles in London; at various cultural societies of which he was a member; and at several London clubs including the King of Clubs of which he had been a founder member. (He is still distinguished by the nickname "Conversation Sharp.") Samuel Rogers (q.v.) was a particularly close friend. Byron's biographer notes that Sharp was "a friend of all the eminent political and literary figures of half a century, from Burke on down" (Marchand). He was elected to Parliament 1806-12 and 1816-19 and was active, mostly behind the scenes, in movements for social and parliamentary reform. In his later years he travelled for his health and kept a country house in Torquay; it was on a return journey from Torquay to London that he died at Dorchester. He left most of his substantial fortune to Maria Kinnaird. Sharp is buried in Bunhill Fields, the dissenters' burial ground. (ODNB 10 Sept. 2020; Leslie Marchand, ed., Byron's Letters and Journals 3 [1974] 216n.) HJ