Author: Williams, Robert Folkestone
Biography:
WILLIAMS, Robert Folkestone (1809-70: findmypast.com)
In the hesitant Preface to Rhymes and Rhapsodies (1833) the reader witnesses the birth of a Victorian man of letters. In this “first production of a young Author” who had hitherto published only anonymously in “popular periodicals,” Williams begs indulgence but acknowledges his ambition. And it is an ambitious volume, containing 250 pages of lyrics, songs, and sonnets; some of the songs were later set to music. Williams was born in London in 1809 and baptised at St. Marylebone on 13 Mar. 1812, the son of Edward and Elizabeth (Pritchard) Williams, who had married at the same church in 1805. He remained a Londoner and continued to contribute to periodicals but made his living as a hardworking editor and author who turned out histories and memoirs in multiple volumes—for example, Lives of the Princes of Wales (1843), Lives of the English Cardinals (1868)—besides ten historical novels, mainly for Colburn, between 1835 and 1868. There were no further collections of poetry. On 6 Nov. 1839 he married Rosa Lucy (Da Ponte) Player, a widow with two children, at St. Anne’s Soho; the couple had three children together. In 1868, however, hard times in the business meant he was unable to interest any publisher in his two-volume history of Marie Antoinette; while he laboured to cut it to half the length, he was without any income but still had a wife and three children at home to support. He applied to the RLF in 1868 and 1869 and was granted £50 and £40. But he fell ill and died at 7 Walpole Street, Chelsea, on 9 Oct. 1870 after four months’ suffering, according to his widow, who applied once more and was awarded £60. (findmypast.com 16 June 2024; ancestry.com 16 June 2024; RLF #1768; Troy J. Bassett, “Robert Folkestone Williams,” victorianresearch.org 16 June 2024) HJ