The name of the classic Pindar has been associated with other writers than Dr. Wolcot, who probably have better claims to use it than ever he had.
Thomas Gray (1716–1771), whose monument in Westminster Abbey bears these lines:
No more the Grecian muse unrivalled reigns,
To Britain let the nations homage pay:
She felt a Homer’s fire in Milton’s strains,
A Pindar’s rapture in the lyre of Gray.
Jean Dorot (1507–1588) and Pouce Denis Debrun (1729–1807), have each worn the title of French Pindar, whilst Gabriello Cluobrera (1552–1637) was the acknowledged Italian Pindar. Peter’s work has been translated into most of the continental tongues, and has been appreciated in Germany especially but not in France, his Francophobia being all too evident in many allusions to the French people. His poetry is too full of the localisms of his native county to be fully appreciated by any but Devonians, and too full of personal and political references and allusions to persons about the court and in the London society of that day to appeal successfully to readers of the present generation.
Our Dr. John Wolcot was the fourth child of Dr. Alexander Wolcot, himself a surgeon’s son residing at Kingsbridge, on the bank of the estuary at the foot of the town. The grounds of the family dwelling extended from the old Dartmouth Road at the back down to the water’s edge, and the house, though much altered, still retains its name of Pindar Lodge. His baptismal register, preserved at the Church of St. Thomas à Becket, Dodbrooke, is dated May 9th, 1738. Of his mother we have not been able to gather much information beyond her name—Mary Ryder—and that she belonged to a local family. The Ryders are still numerously represented in the townships both of Kingsbridge and Dodbrooke.
The Grammar School of Kingsbridge, erected at the cost of the old Puritan, Thomas Crispin, Merchant of Exeter, and endowed by him in 1670, was the place where he commenced his education under the mastership of John Morris. It is to be regretted that no roll of scholars earlier than 1830 is extant, so that we have to depend upon indirect though undoubted evidence as to his connection with this school, but there are lively legends of his school days preserved in the folk-lore of the district, one of which is too characteristic to be omitted.
A certain cobbler whose shop was in the street leading to the Grammar School, a man disliked by the boys, and specially so by young Wolcot, was, to the amazement and horror of the whole township, reported to have been cruelly murdered whilst sitting at his stall. The neighbours, on looking in, were terror-stricken to find the man and his shop from floor to ceiling bespattered with blood. The cobbler was certainly living, but too terrified to speak of the nature of his wounds, his features being covered with gore. He was not, however, seriously injured; indeed he was much frightened and little hurt. What had happened was this. Young Wolcot, whose threats of vengeance against the offender had been somewhat mysterious for several days, had procured an old blunderbuss from his father’s house and had duly charged it with powder, but instead of shot had loaded it with bullock’s blood, and deliberately fired it in the cobbler’s face; of course in one moment transforming the whole appearance of things, and creating in the peaceful neighbourhood a great sensation.