Cawthorn, James

(1719-1761)

   The son of an upholsterer, he was educated at the grammar schools of Sheffield and Kirkby Lonsdale. After graduating from Clare Hall, Cambridge, he became a teacher, eventually becoming headmaster of Tonbridge grammar school, Kent. He was thrown from his horse and killed and was buried in Tonbridge church, where a marble slab with a Latin epitaph was put up for him. Verses were printed to his memory by Lord Eardley in the Gentleman's Magazine, xxxi, 232. His "Abelard and Heloise" was published in the Poetical Calendar in 1746 and his volume Poems was published in 1771. His literary career started at school when he published a periodical, The Tea-Table. He is known to have published the Perjured Lovers while at Sheffield, and soon afterward, "Meditation" in the Gentleman's Magazine. His poems were not collected until 1771, when they were published by subscription. His paraphrase of Job 38 was published in Volume 6 of the Gentleman's Magazine (1736). Some of his other poems: "Of Taste; an Essay," "The Englishman at the Table," "Wit and Learning." (Wit is the name of the cheeky child of Greek mythology who played all sorts of pranks on his elders).

   Sources: Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition, 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. EighteenthCentury English Verse. Dennis Davison, ed. Penguin Books, 1988. English Poetry: Author Search. Chadwyck-Healey Ltd., 1995 (http://www.lib.utexas.edu:8080/search/epoetry/author.html). Gentleman's Magazine (http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/browse-gm2?id=2GM1736). The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The New Oxford Book of Eighteenth Century Verse. Roger Lonsdale, ed. Oxford University Press, 1984. The Oxford Book of Comic Verse. John Gross, ed. Oxford University Press, 1994. The Oxford Book of English Verse. Christopher Ricks, ed. Oxford University Press, 1999.