NEILL, Robert (son of John Neill, captain). b. Irvine, Ayrshire 1822; ed. at Dr. Browne’s school, Greenock, and univ. of Edinb.; called to Scottish bar 1846; partner with his uncle James Dunlop 1846–9, when the latter died; practised by himself 1849–56, and with his brother Stewart Neill 1856 to death; provost of Greenock 1871–2; published Forms of proceedings in maritime causes before the sheriff court in Scotland 1878. d. Balgray, Greenock 18 March 1881. Law Times lxx 430 (1881).
NEILL, Thomas, the assumed name of Thomas Neill Cream. b. Glasgow about 19 May 1850; taken to Quebec when a child; received a medical education at M’Gill college, Montreal 1872–6, when he took a degree; attended lectures at St. Thomas’s hospital, London; took two degrees at univ. of Edinb.; practised as physician in Ontario and at Chicago 1880–1 under his real name; arrived at Liverpool 1 Oct. 1891; lodged at 103 Lambeth palace road, London, until 6 Jany. 1892, and again in April 1892; poisoned by strychnine a woman called Matilda Clover at 27 Lambeth road, London 21 Oct. 1891; probably poisoned also Alice Marsh, Ellen Donworth, and Emma Shrivell; tried at central criminal court for murder of Matilda Clover 17–20 Oct. 1892, found guilty and sentenced to death 20 Oct. hanged by Billington at Newgate prison, London 9 a.m. 15 Nov. 1892. Central criminal court sessions paper, Minutes of evidence cxvi 1417–60 (1892); Times 16 Nov. 1892 p. 11; Daily Graphic 18 Oct. 1892 p. 1 portrait; Spectator 29 Oct. 1892 p. 590.
NEILSON, James Beaumont (younger son of Walter Neilson, engine-wright at the Govan coal works, near Glasgow). b. Shettleston, near Glasgow 22 June 1792; engine-wright of a colliery at Irvine 1814–7; foreman of the Glasgow gas works 1817, manager and engineer of the works 1822–47; invented the swallow-tail burner, which came into general use; invented the hot blast in the manufacture of iron, which is now in general use; patented the invention with his partners, Charles Macintosh and John Wilson 1 Oct. 1828; established the validity of the patent after a ten days’ trial 1843; this invention made available the black band ironstone, formerly useless; M.I.C.E. 1832; F.R.S. 15 Jany. 1846. d. Queenshill, near Kirkcudbright 18 Jany. 1865. Maclehose’s Glasgow Men ii 245–8 (1886) portrait; Min. of proc. of Instit. of C.E. xxx 451–3 (1870); S. Smiles’s Industrial biography (1879) 149–61; Chambers’s Biog. Dict. of eminent Scotsmen iii 215–6 (1870); Report of the case Neilson v. Harford in the court of exchequer, Edinb. (1841); Report of case of Neilson v. Baird (1843).
NEILSON, John Finlay. Parliamentary reporter for The Times nearly 40 years. d. 61 Bessborough st. London 27 July 1881 aged 72.
NEILSON, Lilian Adelaide, stage name of Elizabeth Ann Brown (dau. of Ann Brown, an actress, who became Mrs. Bland). b. 35 St. Peter’s sq. Leeds 3 March 1848; lived at Skipton 1848–50; worked as a mill hand at Guiseley; a nurse girl in the family of Mr. John Padgett at Hawkhill house, Guiseley 1859–61; a barmaid, under name of Lizzie Ann Bland, at a public house near the Haymarket, London; a ballet girl; befriended by admiral Henry Carr Glyn; first appeared on the stage at Margate 1865 as Juliet, under name of Lilian Adelaide Lizon, which she afterwards changed to Neilson; pupil of John Ryder the actor; first appeared in London at Royalty theatre 17 July 1865 as Juliet; the original Gabrielle de Savigny in Watts Phillip’s Huguenot Captain at Princess’s 2 July 1866; played Victorine in the drama Victorine at Adelphi 14 Nov. 1866, the original Nellie Armroyd in W. Phillips’s Lost in London at Adelphi 16 March 1867; played Rosalind at T.R. Edinburgh 25 Sept. 1868; played at Prince of Wales’s theatre, Birmingham in Millicent, an adaption of Miss Braddon’s Captain of the Vulture 2 Nov. 1868; the original Lilian in W. Marston’s Life for life at Lyceum 6 March 1869, Madame Vidal in Oxenford and Wigan’s A life chase 11 Oct. 1869, Mary Belton in Uncle Dick’s Darling 13 Dec. 1869, both at Gaiety; began a series of dramatic readings at St. James’s hall 26 May 1870; appeared as Amy Robsart in A. Halliday’s Kenilworth at Drury Lane 24 Sept. 1870, and as Rebecca in his Ivanhoe 23 Sept. 1871; played Juliet and Pauline at Queen’s Sept. 1872; at Booth’s theatre, New York acted Juliet 18 Nov. 1872, reappeared in America 1873, 1874, 1876, 1877, 1879, and 1880; the first Anne Boleyn in Tom Taylor’s Anne Boleyn at Haymarket 5 Feb. 1876, played there again in 1878; acted Isabel of Bavaria in The crimson cross at Adelphi 27 Feb. 1879; arrived in Paris from London, on her way to Trouville 11 Aug. 1880. d. at the Nouveau chalet du rond royal, Bois de Boulogne, Paris 15 Aug. 1880, body removed to the Morgue same day. bur. West Brompton cemetery, London 20 Aug. L. C. Holloway’s Adelaide Neilson, New York (1885) 8 portraits and view of tomb; M. A. de Leine’s L. A. Neilson, a memorial sketch (1881) portrait; W. Smith’s Old Yorkshire (1890) 94–8, 2 portraits; C. E. Pascoe’s Dramatic List (1880) 271–5; W. Marston’s Our recent actors ii 219–50 (1888); W. Winter’s Shadows of the stage (1892) 47–62, Second series (1892) pp. 268–76; The Theatre ii 155 (1879) portrait, ii 122, 183–4, 247–9, 253, 255, 271–3 (1880) portrait; Illust. sp. and dr. news i 289, 294 (1874) portrait, viii 569, 575 (1878) portrait, and 21 Aug. 1880 p. 558, portrait; Saturday programme 23 Sept. 1876 portrait, 14 Oct. pp. 6–7, and 29 Nov. p. 4; Touchstone 27 April 1878 pp. 3–4 portrait; Lippincott’s Mag. xxx 623; Era Almanac (1893) 17 portrait.
Note.—She was m. on 30 Nov. 1864 at St. Mary, Newington, Surrey, as “Lilian Adelaide Lizon, dau. of Pera Lizon, gentleman,” to Philip Henry Lee, son of P. H. Lee, rector of Stoke Bruerne, Northamptonshire. This marriage was annulled, at her instance, by the supreme court in New York 1877, husband and wife having been previously naturalised as citizens of U.S. America. P. H. Lee m. (2) 21 Oct. 1880 Charlotte Ann Rowe, dau. of Samuel Lillicrap Trevanion Penrose, R.N. and widow of Charles Loftus Thorpe of Sonning, Berkshire.
Miss Neilson who had been unwell from 1876 ruptured a varicose vein in the left fallopian tube, and died from internal hæmorrhage. The Lancet ii 348, 484 (1880).
Her will, dated 25 Sept. 1879, received probate 30 Aug. 1880, being sworn under £25,000, exclusive of the Chicago property, George Henry Lewis sole executor. She left £3,000 to be invested for her mother Ann Bland, half of it at A. Bland’s death to go to her three sisters, the other half to Thomas Brown. To Joseph Knight, theatrical critic £1,000. To Edward Compton, actor £1,000, and the residue to her old and steadfast friend vice admiral Henry Carr Glynn, who d. 16 Feb. 1884. This money has been used as a fund for the relief of actors in distress.
NEILSON, Peter (youngest son of George Neilson, calenderer). b. Glasgow 24 Sept. 1795; ed. at Glasgow high sch. and univ.; with his father an exporter of cambric and cotton goods to America; was in America on business 1822–8; settled at Kirkintilloch, Dumbartonshire 1841; proposed improvements in the life buoy 1846; suggested iron-plated ships to lord John Russell 8 Jany. 1848, the Warrior and Black Prince were built according to his plan; author of Recollections of six years residence in the United States of America, Glasgow 1830; The millenium, a poem 1834; The life and adventures of Zamba, an African king, corrected by P. Neilson 1847; Remarks on ironbuilt ships of war and iron-plated ships of war 1861. d. Kirkintilloch 3 May 1861. interred in burying-ground of Glasgow cathedral. Poems of Peter Neilson, edited with memoir by Dr. Whitelaw (1870).
NEILSON, Walter (son of John Neilson). b. Glasgow March 1807; partner in his father’s millwright and engineering business, Oakbank foundry, Glasgow 1828; built the Fairy Queen, one of the earliest iron ships, which had also the first oscillating marine engines 1831; partner in Wilson’s and co.’s blast furnace iron works, Summerlee, Coatbridge 1836, works became the Summerlee iron co. 1870; adapted the Addenbrook system of collecting the combustible gas and using it in heating the air of the blast, and in getting up steam; owner of coal and ironstone mines; produced sulphate of ammonia from the gasses emitted from the blast furnaces; senior partner in Mossend iron and steel co. on death of his brother, William Neilson; A.I.C.E. 5 May 1868. d. 18 Aug. 1884. Min. of proc. of Instit. of C.E. lxxx 347–9 (1885).