Author: Smeeton, Joseph
Biography:
SMEETON, Joseph (1746-1809: findmypast.com)
The two works listed here were the work of a journeyman printer, Joseph Smeeton, as he acknowledges in a prefatory statement in Minutiae: they were composed “at the press’s side,” with no more instruction than a printing-house provided, and printed off one by one “as opportunities offered.” He was probably the son of William and Ann Smeeton baptised on 8 Apr. 1746 at St. Martin-in-the-Fields, London, who had five children of whom at least one other also went into the book trade. Joseph was apprenticed in the Stationers’ Company in 1762. He may not have set up as a bookseller and stationer himself until 1794, only worked for other publishers. Although some of his poems are about his love for “Miranda” and there might have been an earlier marriage, the first that can be confirmed was to Eliza Forty of Birmingham, whom he married at St. Martin-in-the-Fields on 8 Mar. 1809. Most unfortunately, they were both burnt to death in a fire at their premises on St. Martin’s Lane on 27 May in the same year, and were buried at the same church on 30 May. Although BBTI identifies him as the father of the printer George Smeeton, baptismal records suggest that he may have been his uncle. (findmypast.com 30 Oct. 2024; ancestry.com 30 Oct. 2024; BBTI; Sun [London] 11 Mar. 1809; General Evening Post 30 May 1809)