MASON, Francis (youngest son of Nicholas Mason, lace merchant of Wood st. Cheapside, London). b. Islington 21 July 1837; matric. at London univ.; studied medicine at King’s college, London, hon. fellow; private assistant to sir Wm. Fergusson; M.R.C.S. 1858, F.R.C.S. 1862; house surgeon at King’s college hospital 1859–60, assistant surgeon 1863; surgeon to St. Pancras and Northern dispensary 1863; assistant surgeon to and lecturer on anatomy at Westminster hospital 1867, surgeon 1871; assistant surgeon and lecturer on anatomy at St. Thomas’s hospital 1871–6, surgeon and lecturer on practical surgery 1876; orator of Medical society of London 1870, Lettsonian lecturer 1878, pres. 1882, treasurer; author of On harelip and cleft palate 1877; On the surgery of the face 1878; edited St. Thomas’s hospital reports, vols. ix–xiv (1879–86). d. 5 June 1886. bur. Highgate cemet., portrait in medical committee room at St. Thomas’s hospital. St. Thomas’s hospital reports n.s. xv 249 (1886).
MASON, Frederick. Pugilist weighing 9 stone 8 lbs., always known as The Bulldog; beat Wm. Jones 31 March 1840 and 17 Aug. 1841; beat Stephen Puttock 11 May 1841; beaten by John Walker £60 a side, 62 rounds in 78 minutes at Hanniker, Bagshot 18 Jany. 1842; beat Collinson 27 July 1842; beaten by Harry Broome (who became champion 1851) £50 a side, 39 rounds in 81 minutes near Northfleet 11 Oct. 1843. d. St. Bartholomew’s hospital, London 20 Oct. 1860. H. D. Miles’s Pugilistica, iii 309–14 (1881).
MASON, George Heming (eld. son of George Miles Mason of Fenton park, Stoke-upon-Trent, Staffs.) b. Fenton park 11 March 1818; articled to W. R. Watts, surgeon, Birmingham 1834; walked to Rome 1843–5 where he took a studio; arrested and narrowly escaped death during siege of Rome; painted three fine pictures of the Campagna, namely Ploughing in the Campagna; In the salt marshes 1856 and A fountain with figures; returned to England, married and settled at Wetley abbey near the Potteries 1858; the grandest of English idyllic painters; A.R.A. 1869; exhibited 25 pictures at R.A. 1857–72; completed his largest picture The harvest moon, just before his death; his picture The cast shoe, is in the National Gallery; an exhibition of his works was held at Burlington fine arts club 1873. d. 7 Theresa terrace, Hammersmith 22 Oct. 1872. bur. Brompton cemet. 28 Oct.
MASON, George Henry Monck (son of Thomas Monck Mason, captain R.N.) b. 1825; ensign 74 Bengal N.I. 14 June 1843, lieut. 3 Oct. 1845 to death; assistant to agent at Rajpootana 11 May 1847; political agent at Kerowlee, a small Rajpoot state 1849–57; resident at Jodpore, March 1857 to death; shot dead by the mutineers near the fort of Ahwa 18 Sep. 1857. G.M. i 105–6 (1858).
MASON, Henry Joseph Monck (son of lieut.-col. Henry Monck Mason of Dublin). b. Powerscourt, co. Wicklow 15 July 1778; entered Trin. coll. Dublin 7 Oct. 1793, scholar 1796, gold medallist and B.A. 1798, LL.B. and LL.D. 1817; called to Irish bar 1800; examiner to the prerogative court; began a catalogue of the manuscripts of Trinity coll. Dublin about 1810; assistant librarian of King’s Inns, Dublin 1814, chief librarian 1815–51; correspondent with Robert Southey 1814–34; founded with bishop Daly the Irish society 1818; M.R.I.A. 22 June 1812; author of An essay on the antiquity and constitution of parliaments in Ireland 1820; A grammar of the Irish language 1830, 2 ed. 1839; The life of William Bedell, D.D., lord bishop of Kilmore 1843; Memoir of the Irish version of the Bible 1854. d. Dargle cottage near Bray, co. Wicklow 14 April 1858. bur. in the old cemetery of Powerscourt Demesne. H. J. M. Mason’s Essay on the parliaments in Ireland, with life of the author. By Very Rev. John O’Hanlon (1891).
MASON, Hugh (son of Thomas Mason of Groby lodge, Ashton-under-Lyne). b. Stalybridge, Lancs. 1820; a cotton spinner: proprietor of the Oxford mills, Ashton-under-Lyne; mayor of Ashton 1858–61; president of Manchester chamber of commerce 1871–3; M.P. for Ashton, April 1880 to 18 Nov. 1885, contested Ashton, Nov. 1885. d. 2 Feb. 1886.
MASON, James Wood (eld. son of Joseph Wood Mason, M.D. of Horsley court, Gloucs.) b. 1845 or 1846; superintendent of the Indian museum, Calcutta, and professor of comparative anatomy and physiology at Medical college, Bengal to death. d. on board P. and O. steamship Ganges off the coast of Portugal 6 March 1893.
MASON, John Charles (only son of Alexander Way Mason of the H.E.I.Co.’s home service). b. London, March 1798; clerk in the secretary’s office at the East India house April 1817; secretary of the newly created marine branch of the secretary’s office 1837 to Sep. 1858 when he retired; arranged for the transport of 50,000 troops to India 1857; secretary of the marine and transport department at the East India house Jany. 1859, retired April 1867; represented government of India on committee on Indian overland troop transport service 1865; author of An analysis of the constitution of the East India company and of the laws passed by parliament for the government of their affairs at home and abroad 1825–6. d. 12 Pembridge gardens, Bayswater, London 21 Dec. 1881.
MASON, Sir Josiah (2 son of Josiah Mason, carpet-weaver). b. Mill st. Kidderminster 23 Feb. 1795; worked as a shoemaker, then as a baker and next as a carpet-weaver at Kidderminster; manager for Samuel Harrison of Birmingham, split-ring maker 1824, purchased the business for £500, 1825; invented a plan for making split key-rings by machinery; made steel pens for James Perry, stationer of Red Lion sq. Holborn, London many years from 1830, these pens bore the name of Perry, employed 1000 persons in 1874 and made more than four million pens every week; partner with the Brothers Elkington in electro-plating spoons, forks and other articles 1844–56; established with G. R. Elkington copper-smelting works at Pembrey, Carmarthenshire, and became a nickel smelter; sold his pen manufactory to a limited liability company, Dec. 1875; founded in village of Erdington near Birmingham, almshouses for 30 aged women and an orphanage for 50 girls 1858, erected a new orphanage at cost of £60,000, 1860–8, transferred the edifice with an endowment in land and buildings valued at £200,000 to a body of 7 trustees Aug. 1868; knighted by patent 30 Nov. 1872; founded the Mason Scientific college, Birmingham at cost of £180,000, opened 1 Oct. 1880. d. Norwood house, Erdington 16 June 1881, statue in front of Mason college unveiled 1 Oct. 1885. J. T. Bunce’s Josiah Mason, a biography (1882); Fortunes made in business, i 129–83 (1884); Biograph, iii 119–25 (1880); Dent’s Birmingham (1880) 524, 570, 591–3, 604, with views of College and Orphanage; Edgbastonia, i 48–49 (1881); I.L.N. lv 247, 248 (1869), portrait; Illust. midland news, i 8 (1869), portrait; Practical Mag. i 162 (1873), portrait.
MASON, Stephen (son of David Mason). b. Kennoway, Fifeshire 1832; a merchant at Glasgow; pres. of Glasgow chamber of commerce 1880; M.P. for Mid Lanarkshire 1885–8. d. 4 Thornton villas, Streatham hill, London 21 April 1890.