John Filby Childs (1783–1853) was an English printer, known as a political radical, a successful lobbyist against the monopoly on printing the Bible, and a congregationalist active against church rates.

Life

He was born at

Bungay Bungay () is a market town, civil parish and electoral ward in the East Suffolk district of Suffolk, England.OS Explorer Map OL40: The Broads: (1:25 000) : . It lies in the Waveney Valley, west of Beccles on the edge of The Broads, and at th ...

Suffolk Suffolk ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East of England and East Anglia. It is bordered by Norfolk to the north, the North Sea to the east, Essex to the south, and Cambridgeshire to the west. Ipswich is the largest settlement and the county ...

, and carried on there the family printing business founded in 1795. Charles Brightly had established a printing and stereotype foundry, the business became Brightly & Childs in 1808 and later Messrs. Childs and Son. With Joseph Ogle Robinson, he projected the series of "Imperial octavo editions of standard authors", which sold well for many years; it passed successively through the hands of Westley and Davis, Ball, Arnold & Co., and H. G. Bohn. The select committee of the House of Commons appointed in 1831 to inquire into the monopoly king's printers' patent arose from a meeting between John Childs, his brother and partner Robert, and

Joseph Hume Joseph Hume Fellow of the Royal Society, FRS (22 January 1777 – 20 February 1855) was a Scottish surgeon and Radicals (UK), Radical Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), MP.Ronald K. Huch, Paul R. Ziegler 1985 Joseph Hume, the People's M.P ...

M.P., on the subject of cheap bibles. Childs told the committee that he and his brother had been in business for a quarter of a century, that they employed over a hundred hands, and that they had printed editions of the Bible with notes (thus eluding the patent) for many years. Childs, a staunch nonconformist, suffered imprisonment on account of a conscientious refusal to pay church rates. This occurred in May 1836, and led to the agitation presaging the Braintree case. His incarceration was the subject of a debate in the House of Commons, and a reference by

Sir Robert Peel Sir Robert Peel, 2nd Baronet (5 February 1788 – 2 July 1850), was a British Conservative statesman who twice was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1834–1835, 1841–1846), and simultaneously was Chancellor of the Exchequer (1834–183 ...

to "the Bungay martyr." In 1841 the two Childs brothers, Alderman Besley, and others, established ''The Nonconformist'' newspaper, for many years edited by

Edward Miall Edward Miall (8 May 1809 – 30 April 1881) was an English journalist, apostle of Disestablishmentarianism, disestablishment, founder of the Liberation Society (Society for the Liberation of the Church from State Patronage and Control), and Libe ...

. Miall's early work was supported by a group including Childs and Robert Halley, George Hadfield and Adam Thomson of Coldstream.Arthur Miall, ''Life of Edward Miall, formerly Member of Parliament for Rochdale and Bradford'' (1884), pp. 42–3
archive.org
/ref> He married the daughter of a Mr. Brightley. Their son Charles Childs (1807–1876) became the head of the firm of John Childs & Son. Childs died at Bungay on 12 August 1853, in his seventieth year.

References

;Attribution {{DEFAULTSORT:Childs, John 1783 births 1853 deaths English printers English Congregationalists 19th-century British businesspeople