Author: Wilmot, William
Biography:
WILMOT, William (1766-1856: ancestry.co.uk)
The attribution to this person of the two tales by “William Wilmot, L.L.B.” here, based on his name and legal education, is still conjectural and needs corroboration, but there are no other candidates. William Wilmot was baptised on 15 Aug. 1766 at St. James, Piccadilly, the youngest son of Sir Robert Eardley Wilmot (1708-72), first baronet of Osmaston, and Elizabeth Foote (1730-1811), who later married on 23 Dec. 1769 at Ealing, London. His father had been educated at Christ Church, Oxford, and the Inner Temple, and was secretary to successive viceroys of Ireland 1740-72. His uncle was the judge John Eardley Wilmot (1709-92). William Wilmot was educated at Christ Church, Oxford (matric. 1785, B.C.L. 1803) but nothing is known of his career and he may not have practised law. He spent his life in Pimlico, London; Bexley Heath (now South-East London); and the family seat of Osmaston Hall, Derbyshire. In the 1851 census he was recorded as a landed proprietor at Bexley Heath. He died on 10 June 1856 at his house in Upper Eaton Street, Belgravia, London, and was buried on 17 June at Osmaston, leaving his estate to nephews and nieces. He never married. Besides the works listed here—assuming the attribution is correct--he also wrote a pamphlet, The Causes of, and Remedy for, the Present Lamentable State of Substantial Religion (1830), of which no copy seems to have survived. (ancestry.co.uk 14 Apr. 2024; findmypast.co.uk 14 Apr. 2024; Burke’s Peerage [1830], 826; Morning Post 14 June 1819; Globe 1 Apr. 1830; MH 16 June 1856; GM July 1856, 125) AA
Other Names:
- W. Wilmot