Author: Whewell, William
Biography:
WHEWELL, William (1794-1866: ODNB)
He was born on 24 May 1794 and baptised at St. Anne’s, Lancaster, Lancashire, on 22 June, the eldest of seven children of a master carpenter, John Whewell, and his wife Elizabeth (Betty) Bennison. His academic quality was recognised early, and after attending Lancaster Grammar in his native city and Heversham Grammar School in Westmorland he was able to go up to Trinity College, Cambridge, with a scholarship in 1811 (matric. 1812, BA 1816, Fellow 1817, MA 1819, BD 1838, DD 1844). He won the Chancellor’s Medal for English poetry with Boadicea in 1814 when he was an undergraduate; it remains his only known publication in verse. His parents and all but two of his siblings died before 1817 and he spent the rest of his life at Trinity, first as lecturer in mathematics and later with a string of professorships and honours. He was ordained deacon in 1825 and priest in 1826. But his was hardly a cloistered life. He travelled on the continent and throughout the British Isles with friends and colleagues, and maintained a large scientific correspondence. He acquired proficiency in mechanics, mineralogy, astronomy, and the study of tides, and built on his research to formulate a comprehensive theory of science. His best known works are a History and a Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, published in multiple volumes in 1837 and 1840 respectively. (To him are attributed the coinages “scientist” and “physicist.”) In the Lake District on a geological expeditions in 1821 he met William Wordsworth (q.v.) who introduced him to the family of his first wife, Cordelia Marshall (1804-55), whom he married in 1841. He also outlived his second wife, Evelina Frances (Ellis) Affleck (1806-65), whom he married in 1858. There were no children. In 1841 he succeeded Wordsworth’s brother Christopher as Master of Trinity and continued his prodigious output of scientific books and papers while working to reform the Cambridge curriculum—and having a statue of Byron (q.v.) installed in the College Library, where it remains to this day. He died at Trinity on 6 Mar. 1866 from injuries sustained in a fall from his horse, and was buried in the ante-chapel four days later. He left an estate valued at under £70,000, part of which went to establish the Whewell Professorships and scholarships in international law. (ODNB 12 May 2024; ancestry.com 12 May 2024; findmypast.com 12 May 2024; ACAD) HJ