Richard Alfred Davenport (1777–1852) was an English miscellaneous writer.

Life

Davenport was born in

Lambeth Lambeth () is a district in South London, England, which today also gives its name to the (much larger) London Borough of Lambeth. Lambeth itself was an ancient parish in the county of Surrey. It is situated 1 mile (1.6 km) south of Charin ...

on 18 January 1777, and started work as a writer in London at an early age. In the late 1790s he knew John Britton and Peter Lionel Courtier through a debating society, the "School of Eloquence". Davenport wrote large portions of the history, biography, geography, and criticism in Rivington's ''

Annual Register ''The Annual Register'' (originally subtitled "A View of the History, Politicks and Literature of the Year ...") is a long-established reference work, written and published each year, which records and analyses the year's major events, developmen ...

'' for several years (1792 to 1797, according to John Britton). He edited, with lives, a number of the British poets for the

Chiswick Press The Chiswick Press was founded by Charles Whittingham I (1767–1840) in 1811. The management of the Press was taken over in 1840 by the founder's nephew Charles Whittingham II (1795–1876). The name was first used in 1811, and the Press contin ...

edition in 100 volumes (1822); the biographies were supplied from the existing ones

Samuel Johnson Samuel Johnson ( – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, literary critic, sermonist, biographer, editor, and lexicographer. The ''Oxford ...

, with Davenport,

Samuel Weller Singer Samuel Weller Singer (1783–1858) was an English author and scholar on the work of William Shakespeare. He is also now remembered as a pioneer historian of card games. Life Born in London, he was son of Thomas Singer, a feather and artificial- ...

, and some others, writing the rest. Later he did much work for

Thomas Tegg Thomas Tegg (1776–1845) was a British bookseller and publisher. One of his best-known publications is the '' London Encyclopaedia'' of 1829 and 1839. Early life Tegg was the son of a grocer, born at Wimbledon, Surrey, on 4 March 1776, and was ...

. For the last 11 years of his life Davenport lived at Brunswick Cottage, Park Street,

Camberwell Camberwell ( ) is an List of areas of London, area of South London, England, in the London Borough of Southwark, southeast of Charing Cross. Camberwell was first a village associated with the church of St Giles' Church, Camberwell, St Giles ...

, a freehold house of which he was the owner. Here he lived and working alone, drinking large quantities of

laudanum Laudanum is a tincture of opium containing approximately 10% powdered opium by weight (the equivalent of 1% morphine). Laudanum is prepared by dissolving extracts from the opium poppy (''Papaver somniferum'') in alcohol (ethanol). Reddish-br ...

, in some squalor at the end. On Sunday, 25 January 1852, a passing policeman was attracted by someone moaning. He broke into the house and discovered Davenport unconscious, with a laudanum bottle in his hand. He died before anything could be done for him. An inquest found his death to be an accidental overdose.

Works

Biography

Besides his work for the Chiswick Press ''Poets'', Davenport compiled ''A Dictionary of Biography'' (1831), and produced an edition of

Matthew Pilkington Matthew Pilkington (1701–1774), Church of Ireland priest, writer, and art historian, was the author of a standard text on painters that became known as ''Pilkington's Dictionary''. His first wife was the poet and memoirist Laetitia Pilkington a ...

's ''General Dictionary of Painters'' (1852).

Other works

Davenport also wrote: * ''New Elegant Extracts'', 2nd series, Chiswick, 12 vols. 1823–7; * ''The Commonplace Book of Epigrams'', a collection in which some pieces are original, Edinburgh, 1825. * ''Sketches of Imposture, Deception, and Credulity '', London, 1837. To ''

Murray's Family Library ''Murray's Family Library'' was a series of non-fiction works published from 1829 to 1834, by John Murray, in 51 volumes. The series editor was John Gibson Lockhart, who also wrote the first book, a biography of Napoleon. The books were priced a ...

'' Davenport contributed: * ''The Life of Ali Pasha of Tepeleni, Vizier of Epirus, surnamed Aslan or the Lion'', 1837; * ''The History of the Bastile and of its principal Captives'', 1838, several editions; * ''Narratives of Peril and Suffering'', 2 vols. 1840, new edition, New York, 1846; * ''Lives of Individuals who raised themselves from Poverty to Eminence and Fortune'', 1841. Davenport translated many works, and contributed to periodical literature articles on biography, poetry, criticism, and other subjects. He was also a writer of verse. Some of it was set to music, by his friend Timothy Essex. Editorial roles included the works of William Robertson the historian, with life, 1824;

William Mitford William Mitford (10 February 1744 – 10 February 1827) was an English historian, landowner, and politician. His best known work is ''The History of Greece'', published in ten volumes between 1784 and 1810. Early years William Mitford was bor ...

's ''History of Greece'', with continuation to the death of Alexander, 1835; and some works like William Guthrie's ''Geographical, Historical, and Commercial Grammar'', and

William Enfield William Enfield (29 March 1741 – 3 November 1797) was a British Unitarian minister who published a bestselling book on elocution entitled ''The Speaker'' (1774). Life Enfield was born in Sudbury, Suffolk to William and Ann Enfield. In 1758, h ...

's ''Speaker''.

Family

Davenport married in 1800; they later separated, and she became a novelist under her married name

Selina Davenport Selina Davenport (27 June 1779 – 14 July 1859) was an English novelist, briefly married to the miscellanist and biographer Richard Alfred Davenport. Her eleven published novels have been recently described as "effective if stereotyped".''The ...

. They had two daughters together; a son Theodore Alfred Davenport was not from this marriage.

Elizabeth Gaskell Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell (''née'' Stevenson; 29 September 1810 – 12 November 1865), often referred to as Mrs Gaskell, was an English novelist, biographer, and short story writer. Her novels offer detailed studies of Victorian era, Victoria ...

encountered Selina Davenport in

Knutsford Knutsford () is a market town and civil parish in the Cheshire East district, in Cheshire, England; it is located south-west of Manchester, north-west of Macclesfield and south-east of Warrington. The population of the parish at the 2021 Uni ...

around 1850.

Notes

External links

Works by Richard Alfred Davenport
at

Project Gutenberg Project Gutenberg (PG) is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, as well as to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks." It was founded in 1971 by American writer Michael S. Hart and is the oldest digital li ...

* ;Attribution {{DEFAULTSORT:Davenport, Richard Alfred 1777 births 1852 deaths English writers Drug-related deaths in London