On the 17th, in New York, Thom, the self-taught and celebrated Scottish sculptor. His “Tarn O’Shanter,” and “Old Mortality,” obtained for him a wide-spread fame in Great Britain and the United States of America.
On the 23rd, at Rydal Mount, near Ambleside, William Wordsworth, D.C.L., the poet, whose works have had a universal circulation. His chief productions are “The Evening Walk,” “The Excursion,” and “The White Doe of Rylstone.” He also wrote many deeply touching minor poems.
May 24th, Miss Jane Porter, authoress of many works, which have been translated into various languages. The most popular of these were “Thaddeus of Warsaw,” and the “Scottish Chiefs.” Sir Walter Scott is represented as having admitted to George IV. that his idea of the “Waverley Novels” was suggested by the perusal of the “Scottish Chiefs.” If this currently believed anecdote be correct, Miss Porter was the founder of the school of modern historical novels, and not Sir Walter Scott.
On the 27th, Mr. Richard J. Wyatt, known as a sculptor of great merit throughout Europe. His death took place at Rome.
July 4th, at Barham, Suffolk, Canon Kirby, rector of that parish. He was a distinguished naturalist, and the author of various eminent works, especially in the department of entomology. His Monographic, Apium Anglio, his description of the Fauna Boreali Americana, and his “Bridgewater Treatise,” on the “history, habits, and instincts of animals,” have made him a world-wide tame.
July 12th, Mr. Robert Stephenson, civil engineer, who had obtained an honourable notoriety for his achievements in his profession.
August 19th, Sir Martin Shee, president of the Royal Academy. He was not only celebrated as a painter, but was an accomplished scholar and author.
On the 30th of October, one of the most benevolent and amiable ladies in the world of letter’s, Mrs. Bell Martin, died at New York. This gifted lady was born at Ballinahinch Castle, in Galway. Her father, Mr. Thomas Barnewell Martin, M.P. for Galway, died in 1847. Miss Martin married a Mr. Bell, who assumed the name of Martin. The estates of Mr. Martin, of Ballinahinch, were in area the largest in the United Kingdom, and Miss Martin was commonly styled “the Irish heiress,” from her very large patrimony. The failure of the potato crops, and the ensuing famine, which afflicted Ireland for several years, ruined Miss Martin’s inheritance. The estates were encumbered, and as landed property in Ireland during “the famine years” brought but little in the market, the Ballinahinch properly was thrown into the Encumbered Estates Court, and there were no assets for “the heiress,” She left the extensive region over which she had almost reigned as a princess, without any longer having a claim to a single acre. She was in deep distress, and, to the dishonour of the gentry of Ireland, she found no friends in her hour of trial. She took up her residence on the continent, and supported herself by her pen: she was the authoress of “St. Etienne, a tale of the Vendean war,” “Julia Howard,” and some minor works. Her contributions to the Encyclopédie des Gens de Monde were numerous, and gained her high reputation. She eventually sought New York as the sphere of her enterprise. During the voyage she was prematurely confined, and died in consequence, soon after her arrival at the Union Place Hotel. It was generally believed in that city, and in the land of her birth, that uneasiness as to her temporal prospects aggravated, and perhaps caused the illness, which proved fatal to this highly gifted lady.
November 15th, Joseph Hullmandle, whose inventions and improvements connected with lithography, and tinted lithographic printing, contributed so much to the perfection of that branch of artistic skill.
November 26th, Lord Nugent, a celebrated politician, poet, and man of letters. The title was Irish, and became extinct with him.