HOOK, JAMES, eldest son of James Hook, organist and composer at Vauxhall Gardens, and his first wife Eliza Jane Madden; bapt. St. Giles in the Fields 18 Jun 1771; adm. 16 Jan 1786; KS (aged 15) 1788; said on one occasion to have dressed up as an old woman, and to have begged half a crown from Dr Vincent in Dean’s Yard (Forshall, Westminster School, 575); editor, The Trifler; etched the caricature “representing Justice as weighing the Microcosm [Etonian magazine] against the Trifler, and the former with its authors, and the King as a make-weight on their side, was made to kick the beam” (Southey, Life and Correspondence, i, 146); was not allowed to present himself for Election to the Universities in 1792 on account of this act of misbehaviour; St. Mary Hall, Oxford, matr. 8 Jun 1792; BA and MA 1799; BCL 1804; DCL 1806; ordained deacon 1796, priest (Winchester) 7 May 1797; apparently held livings in Gloucestershire, Leicestershire and Lincolnshire; Rector of Hertingfordbury, Herts. (disp. to hold with Rector of St. Andrew with St. Nicholas, Hertford 1805); Prebendary of Winchester 18 Oct 1807 – Aug 1825; Archdeacon of Huntingdon from 5 Jul 1814; Rector of Whippingham, Isle of Wight 1817-25 (disp. to hold with Vicar of Preston Candover, Hampshire 1817); Dean of Worcester from 12 Aug 1825, also Vicar of Bromsgrove, Worcs., from 1 Jun 1826, and Vicar of Stone, Worcs., from 12 Jun 1826; Master of St. Oswald’s Hospital, Worcester, from 25 Aug 1825; FRS 29 Feb 1816; author, Anguis in Herba, 1802, two novels and other works; m. 1 Jun 1797 Anne, sister of Sir Thomas Harvie Farquhar, Bart. (qv); d. 5 Feb 1828. DNB.