Author: Warrington, William
Biography:
WARRINGTON, William (1735-1824: DWB)
He was born at Brynyffynon, Wrexham, in 1735, the fifth of eight children of George Warrington (1695-1770) and his wife Elizabeth Thornhill (1706-88), both minor gentry from Lancashire who had married in 1728. Nothing is known of his education. His younger brother, George Warrington (q.v.), was educated at Shrewsbury and St. John’s College Cambridge. He married Dorothy Lever (1735-1806) on 28 Apr. 1761 at Prestwich, Cheshire. They had one daughter. From the 1780s until his death he seems to have lived in the St. Marylebone area of London for part of the year. Relatively late in life he was ordained deacon (1783) and priest (1784). In 1786 he became chaplain to William Ponsonby, second earl of Bessborough (1704-93), who may have secured for him the living of Old Windsor, Berkshire, in 1789, which he held until his death. On 31 Dec. 1800 he conducted the funeral of Mary Robinson with John Wolcot (Peter Pindar) and William Godwin in attendance (qq.v.). The two verse dramas listed here were both privately printed by C. S. Wetton of nearby Egham and the attributions of them to Warrington seem secure although The Cambrian Hero is sometimes attributed to William Sotheby. He died on 31 Jan. 1834 and was buried on 9 Feb. at Old Windsor, where there are inscriptions on the family tomb. In his lifetime he was better known for The History of Wales in Nine Books (1786) which was reprinted at least four times. At 628 pages, with judicious footnotes, it superseded William Wynne’s History of Wales(1697) which had mainly used The Historie of Cambria (1584). He originally planned the work in 1778 by making three tours in North Wales and corresponded with Thomas Pennant on the subject (National Archives, Kew). He may also have been the author of the manuscript Tour of North Wales [1775-6] in the National Library of Wales. (DWB; CCEd 10 Sept. 2022; ancestry.co.uk 10 Sept. 2022; National Library of Wales, MS 16351C; NA, CR 2017/TP384) AA