Bonnell Thornton
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Bonnell Thornton
Bonnell Thornton (1725–1768) was an English poet, essayist, and critic. He was educated at Westminster School, and at Christ Church, Oxford, where he graduated B.A. in 1747. In 1752 Thornton founded the ''Drury Lane Journal'', a satirical periodical which, among other things, lampooned other journals such as Johnson's ''Rambler'', ''The Gentleman's Magazine'' and ''The London Magazine''. Twelve issues were published between January and April 1752. From 1754 to 1756 he published, with George Colman, a six-page weekly serial, ''The Connoisseur'', which, although criticised by Dr. Johnson for lack of substance, ran to 140 issues. He was a frequent contributor to ''The Gentleman's Magazine''. Thornton was also a member of the Nonsense Club of Old Westminster men with George Colman, William Cowper, Charles Churchill and Robert Lloyd. He married Sylvia Braithwaite, younger and posthumous daughter of Colonel John Braithwaite by his wife Silvia Cole, and sister of Major-General Sir ...
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Westminster School
(God Gives the Increase) , established = Earliest records date from the 14th century, refounded in 1560 , type = Public school Independent day and boarding school , religion = Church of England , head_label = Head Master , head = Gary Savage , chair_label = Chairman of Governors , chair = John Hall, Dean of Westminster , founder = Henry VIII (1541) Elizabeth I (1560 – refoundation) , address = Little Dean's Yard , city = London, SW1P 3PF , country = England , local_authority = City of Westminster , urn = 101162 , ofsted = , dfeno = 213/6047 , staff = 105 , enrolment = 747 , gender = BoysCoeducational (Sixth Form) , lower_age = 13 (boys), 16 (girls) , upper_age = 18 , houses = Busby's College Ashburnham Dryden's Grant's Hakluyt's Liddell's Milne's Purcell's Rigaud's Wren's , colours = Pink , public ...
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Christ Church, Oxford
Christ Church ( la, Ædes Christi, the temple or house, '' ædēs'', of Christ, and thus sometimes known as "The House") is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, the college is uniquely a joint foundation of the university and the cathedral of the Oxford diocese, Christ Church Cathedral, which both serves as the college chapel and whose dean is ''ex officio'' the college head. The college is amongst the largest and wealthiest of colleges at the University of Oxford, with an endowment of £596m and student body of 650 in 2020. As of 2022, the college had 661 students. Its grounds contain a number of architecturally significant buildings including Tom Tower (designed by Sir Christopher Wren), Tom Quad (the largest quadrangle in Oxford), and the Great Dining Hall, which was the seat of the parliament assembled by King Charles I during the English Civil War. The buildings have inspired replicas throughout the world in a ...
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Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson (18 September 1709  – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer. The ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' calls him "arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history". Born in Lichfield, Staffordshire, he attended Pembroke College, Oxford until lack of funds forced him to leave. After working as a teacher, he moved to London and began writing for ''The Gentleman's Magazine''. Early works include ''Life of Mr Richard Savage'', the poems ''London'' and ''The Vanity of Human Wishes'' and the play ''Irene''. After nine years' effort, Johnson's '' A Dictionary of the English Language'' appeared in 1755, and was acclaimed as "one of the greatest single achievements of scholarship". Later work included essays, an annotated ''The Plays of William Shakespeare'', and the apologue ''The History of R ...
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The Gentleman's Magazine
''The Gentleman's Magazine'' was a monthly magazine founded in London, England, by Edward Cave in January 1731. It ran uninterrupted for almost 200 years, until 1922. It was the first to use the term ''magazine'' (from the French ''magazine'', meaning "storehouse") for a periodical. Samuel Johnson's first regular employment as a writer was with ''The Gentleman's Magazine''. History The original complete title was ''The Gentleman's Magazine: or, Trader's monthly intelligencer''. Cave's innovation was to create a monthly digest of news and commentary on any topic the educated public might be interested in, from commodity prices to Latin poetry. It carried original content from a stable of regular contributors, as well as extensive quotations and extracts from other periodicals and books. Cave, who edited ''The Gentleman's Magazine'' under the pen name "Sylvanus Urban", was the first to use the term ''magazine'' (meaning "storehouse") for a periodical. Contributions to the magazi ...
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George Colman The Elder
George Colman (April 1732 – 14 August 1794) was an English dramatist and essayist, usually called "the Elder", and sometimes "George the First", to distinguish him from his son, George Colman the Younger. He also owned a theatre. Early life He was born in Florence, where his father was stationed as British Resident Minister (diplomatic envoy) at the court of the Grand Duke of Tuscany. Colman's father died within a year of his son's birth and William Pulteney- afterwards Lord Bath- whose wife was Mrs. Colman's sister, undertook to educate the boy. After he received private education in Marylebone, George attended Westminster School. Colman left school in due course for Christ Church, Oxford. There he made the acquaintance of the parodist Bonnell Thornton, with whom he co-founded '' The Connoisseur'' (1754–1756), a periodical which "wanted weight," as Johnson said, although it reached its 140th number. He left Oxford after taking his degree in 1755 and, having been entered a ...
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Nonsense Club
The Nonsense Club was a scandalous club of 18th-century Kingdom of Great Britain, British satirists centred on Westminster School. Its members included the satirists and poets Charles Churchill (satirist), Charles Churchill and Robert Lloyd (poet), Robert Lloyd, the parodist Bonnell Thornton, the nature poet William Cowper, and the dramatist George Colman the Elder, George Colman. Some of the group's meetings may also have been attended by William Hogarth. The club engaged in a host of colourfully virulent literary and theatrical battles, produced a distinctive brand of satire, and combined its impact with that of John Wilkes, Wilkes to foment some of the most important political debates of its time. Further reading

* * * 18th century in London Clubs and societies in London {{UK-org-stub ...
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William Cowper
William Cowper ( ; 26 November 1731 – 25 April 1800) was an English poet and Anglican hymnwriter. One of the most popular poets of his time, Cowper changed the direction of 18th-century nature poetry by writing of everyday life and scenes of the English countryside. In many ways, he was one of the forerunners of Romantic poetry. Samuel Taylor Coleridge called him "the best modern poet", whilst William Wordsworth particularly admired his poem ''Yardley-Oak''. After being institutionalised for insanity, Cowper found refuge in a fervent evangelical Christianity. He continued to suffer doubt and, after a dream in 1773, believed that he was doomed to eternal damnation. He recovered and wrote more religious hymns. His religious sentiment and association with John Newton (who wrote the hymn "Amazing Grace") led to much of the poetry for which he is best remembered, and to the series of Olney Hymns. His poem "Light Shining out of Darkness" gave English the phrase: "God moves ...
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Charles Churchill (satirist)
Charles Churchill (February 1732 – 4 November 1764) was an English poet and satirist. Early life Churchill was born in Vine Street, Westminster. His father, Rev. Charles Churchill, was rector of Rainham, Essex, held the curacy and lectureship of St Johns, Westminster, from 1733, and Charles was educated at Westminster School, where he became a good classical scholar, and formed a close and lasting friendship with Robert Lloyd. He was admitted to St John's College, Cambridge on 8 July 1748. Churchill contracted a marriage with a Miss Scot within the rules of the Fleet in his eighteenth year, and never lived at Cambridge; the young couple lived in his father's house, and Churchill was afterwards sent to the north of England to prepare for holy orders. He became curate of the church of St Thomas à Becket in South Cadbury, Somerset, and, on receiving priest's orders (1756), began to act as his father's curate at Rainham. Two years later the elder Churchill died, and the son w ...
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Robert Lloyd (poet)
: Robert Lloyd (1733–1764) was an English poet and satirist. Lloyd was educated at Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating B.A. in 1755 and M.A. in 1758. He was author of the popular poem ''The Actor'' (1760) and the comic opera ''The Capricious Lovers'' (1764), first performed at Drury Lane just a few weeks before his death. He was co-author, with George Colman, of ''Ode to Obscurity'' and ''Ode to Oblivion'', both published in the early 1760s, and both satires on the works of the poets William Mason and Thomas Gray. He was also co-editor of ''St James's Magazine'' (1762-3), and member of the infamous Nonsense Club of Old Westminster men with Bonnell Thornton, George Colman, William Cowper and others. Lloyd was often in debt, and apparently died in Fleet Prison on 15 December 1764, shortly after the death of his lifelong friend Charles Churchill, to whose sister, Patty, he was engaged. Churchill's sister died shortly after. The ''Dictionary of Nati ...
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John Braithwaite (author)
John Braithwaite (1696–1740), was an English author. Career Braithwaite (also spelt Brathwaite and other variants) was the author of ''The History of the Revolution in the Empire of Morocco upon the Death of the late Emperor Muley Ishmael'', published in 1729 and translated into Dutch in 1729, German in 1730, and French in 1731. In his preface Braithwaite describes himself as being in the service of the African Company, and as having, when very young, served in the fleet in Anne's reign, and then having been a lieutenant in the Welsh fusiliers, ensign in the Royal Guards, and secretary to his kinsman Christian Cole, the British resident at Venice, with whom he travelled through Europe. Braithwaite married Christian's niece Silvia, whose father was a merchant in Amsterdam. He also states that he was in the Saint Lucia and Saint Vincent expeditions, and was present at the siege of Gibraltar (1727). Thence he crossed to Morocco and joined the British consul-general, John Russe ...
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Sir John Braithwaite, 1st Baronet
Major-General Sir John Braithwaite, 1st Baronet (3 February 1739 – 16 August 1803) was Commander-in-Chief of the Madras Army. Background He was born in South Carolina, the only son of Colonel John Braithwaite (1696–1740), author, soldier and diplomat, and his wife Silvia Cole (1714–1799), daughter of William Cole of Amsterdam. He was only a year old when his father, returning home, was killed when the ship he was travelling on was attacked by a Spanish privateer, "the Biscaya", off the Scilly Isles: he was reported to have been murdered in cold blood after the ship surrendered. His mother remarried Reverend Thomas Winstanley. Military career Educated at Westminster School, Braithwaite was commissioned as an ensign in the 53rd Regiment of Foot on 6 November 1765. Promoted to lieutenant-colonel on 22 October 1772, he seized the Maharaja of Vizianagram's fort during a local dispute on 28 August 1777. He was then given command of a brigade which included one battalion of Eur ...
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People Educated At Westminster School, London
A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of property, or legal responsibility. The defining features of personhood and, consequently, what makes a person count as a person, differ widely among cultures and contexts. In addition to the question of personhood, of what makes a being count as a person to begin with, there are further questions about personal identity and self: both about what makes any particular person that particular person instead of another, and about what makes a person at one time the same person as they were or will be at another time despite any intervening changes. The plural form "people" is often used to refer to an entire nation or ethnic group (as in "a people"), and this was the original meaning of the word; it subsequently acquired its use as a plural form of per ...
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