ACTON, CHARLES JANUARIUS EDWARD, brother of Sir Ferdinand Richard Edward Dalberg-Acton, Bart. (qv); b. 6 Mar 1803; adm. 30 Sep 1813; left the same year on religious grounds, and went to a private tutor; Magdalene Coll. Cambridge, adm. fellow commoner 18 Jul 1819, matr. Lent 1820, residing to 1823; adm. Lincoln’s Inn 29 Jun 1822; entered Pontifica Accademia dei Nobili Ecclesiastici, Rome; Chamberlain to Pope Leo XII; attaché to Papal Nuncio in Paris 1828; Vice-Legate, Bologna to 1830; Secretary to Congregation for Regular Discipline; Auditor, Apostolic Chamber Jan 1837 - Jan 1842; Cardinal Priest from 24 Jan 1842, with titular church of Sta Maria della Pace; all English affairs of consequence were referred to Acton by Pope Gregory XVI and it was owing to his zeal that England was divided into eight instead of four Catholic districts in 1840; d. unm. at Naples 23 Jun 1847. DNB.

Adrian, Edgar Douglas, 1st Baron Adrian; brother of Harold Douglas Adrian (q.v.); b. Nov. 30, 1889; adm. Sept. 24, 1903; K.S. (non-resident) Sept. 22, 1904 (G); elected head to Trin. Coll. Camb. (with Samwaies) July 1908, scholar 1908, fellow Oct. 9, 1913; St class Nat. Science Trip., part 1, 1910, part 2 (Physiology), 1911; B.A. 1911; M.A. 1915; M.B. and B.C. 1915; M. D. 1919; represented Camb. in the Inter-University Foils Competition 1912; joint Coutts Trotter student 1912; Walsingham Gold Medal for Physiology 1912; Gedge Prize 1914; Rolleston Memorial Prize 1916; Horton-Smith Prize 1919; Lecturer at Trin. Coll. 1919; University Lecturer in Advanced Physiology 1920; was a student at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, M.R.C.P. (London), 1916; F.R.S. 1923; F.R.C.P. 1924; a Governor of the School March 1926; Foulerton Research Professor of the Royal Society 1929-37; Nobel Prize 1932; Hon. D.Sc. Oxon. 1936; various degrees later from British and foreign universities; Professor of Physiology, Cambridge, 1937-51; Master of Trinity Coll. Camb. since 1951; Vice-Chancellor 1957-59; first Chancellor of Univ. of Leicester 1958; Copley Medal of the Royal Soc. 1946; Foreign Secretary of the Royal Soc. 1946-50, and President 1950-55; President of the British Association 1954; President, Royal Society of Medicine, 1960-62; O.M. June 11, 1942; created Baron Adrian 1955; a Busby Trustee 1949; elected a Trustee of the Rockefeller Institute 1962; temp. Lieut. R.A.M.C. Jan. 1, 1916, Capt. Jan. 1, 1917-19; m. June 14, 1923, Hester Agnes, daughter of Hume Chancellor Pinsent, of Boar's Hill, Oxford; d. 4 Aug. 1977.

AMHERST, WILLIAM PITT, 1ST EARL AMHERST, only son of Lieut. -Gen. William Amherst MP, and Elizabeth, dau. of Thomas Paterson, London; b. 14 Jan 1773; adm. 19 Feb 1781; in school lists 1786, Christmas 1788; Christ Church, Oxford, matr. 13 Oct 1789, commoner, Canoneer Student 23 Dec 1789 - 5 Aug 1800 (void, by marriage); BA 1793; MA 1797; Grand Tour (Switzerland, Italy) 1793-6; succ. uncle by special remainder as 2nd Baron Amherst 3 Aug 1797; a Lord of the Bedchamber 27 Apr 1802 - May 1804, Jun 1804- Mar 1812; Envoy to Court of Sicily 1809-11; again a Lord of the Bedchamber 18 Apr 1815- Mar 1823; Privy Councillor 30 Dec 1815; appointed Ambassador to China 20 Jan 1816, but was unable to obtain audience of the Chinese Emperor, and returned to England 1817; appointed Governor-General of Bengal 23 Oct 1822, taking office 1 Aug 1823; declared war against Burma 24 Feb 1824; supported claims of Rajah of Bhurtpore against Doorjan Sal; created Earl Amherst 19 Dec 1826; returned to England 1828; again a Lord of the Bedchamber 20 Nov 1829- May 1835; GCH 1834; nominated Governor of Canada by Sir Robert Peel when leaving office in 1835, but the appointment was cancelled by the new Whig ministry; LLD Cambridge 1835; Busby Trustee 11 May 1819; m. 1st, 24 Jul 1800 Sarah, Countess of Plymouth, widow of Other Windsor, 5th Earl of Plymouth, and eldest dau. of Andrew Archer, 2nd Baron Archer; m. 2nd, 25 May 1839 Mary, Countess of Plymouth, widow of Other Windsor, 6th Earl of Plymouth, and eldest dau. of John Frederick Sackville, 3rd Duke of Dorset (qv); d. 13 Mar 1857. DNB.

ASHBURNHAM, BERTRAM, 4TH EARL OF ASHBURNHAM, eldest son of George Ashburnham, 3rd Earl of Ashburnham (qv), and his second wife; b. 23 Nov 1797; adm. Midsummer 1811; left 1814; succ. father as 4th Earl of Ashburnham 27 Oct 1830; DL JP Sussex; a famous collector of rare books and manuscripts; he is said to have started his collection in 1814 while a boy at the School, by the purchase of a rare copy of the Secrets of Albertus Magnus for eighteen pence at Ginger’s shop in Great College Street, and to have continued buying with unwavering judgment and success until a few months before his death; m. 8 Jan 1840 Katherine Charlotte, dau. of George Baillie MP, Jerviswood, Lanarkshire, and sister of George Baillie-Hamilton, 10th Earl of Haddington; d. 22 Jun 1878.

ATTERBURY, FRANCIS, brother of Lewis Atterbury (qv); b. 6 Mar 1662/3; adm.; KS 1674; elected head to Christ Church, Oxford 1680, matr. 17 Dec 1680, aged 17, Westminster Student 18 Dec 1680-94 (void, perhaps on marriage), Tutor 1687-90; BA 1684; MA 1687; BD and DD 5 May 1701; replied to Obadiah Walker’s attack upon the Reformation 1687; assisted his pupil Hon. Charles Boyle in his defence of the genuineness of the Epistles of Phalaris against Bentley; ordained; Lecturer, St. Bride’s, London 1701; Chaplain in Ordinary to William III and Queen Mary, subsequently to Queen Anne; warmly opposed Erastianism and protested against the suppression of Convocation; Archdeacon of Totnes 11 Jun 1701-13; Prebendary of Exeter 6 May 1704; Dean of Carlisle 2 Oct 1704; Prolocutor of Lower House of Convocation 1710; Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, 28 Sep 1711-3; installed Dean of Westminster 16 Jun 1713 and consecrated Bishop of Rochester 15 Jul 1713; although he took part officially in the coronation of George I, he refused to sign the declaration of confidence in the government after the rebellion of 1715, and subsequently was in direct communication with the Jacobites; arrested and imprisoned in the Tower 24 Aug 1722, for his alleged connection with an attempt to restore the Stuarts; a bill of pains and penalties was passed through the House of Commons, and carried in the House of Lords by 83 votes to 43; deprived of all his ecclesiastical preferments 1 Jun 1723, and banished from the kingdom; visited in the Tower by some of the senior King’s Scholars before his departure; resided first at Brussels and afterwards in France as general adviser to the Old Pretender; a man of marked attainments, but cursed with an imperious and aggressive temper, and possessed of “a rare talent for fomenting discord”; his old friend George Smalridge (qv), who succeeded him both at Carlisle and at Christ Church, used to say that “Atterbury comes first and sets everything on fire, and I follow with a bucket of water”; regarded as one of the leading preachers of his day, and in Addison’s opinion was “one of the greatest geniuses of his age”; much to the annoyance of Old Westminsters, Atterbury removed the Election in 1718 from the School to the Jerusalem Chamber, and put down the Election Dinner (HMC Portland MSS, v, 561, vii, 275); owing to his insistence the new Dormitory was built on its present site, the first stone being laid 24 Apr 1722; Busby Trustee from 27 Feb 1705/6; m. c. 1695 Catherine Osborne; d. in exile in Paris 22 Feb 1731/2 and buried privately in the south aisle of the nave of Westminster Abbey 12 May 1732. DNB.

BENTHAM, JEREMY, son of Jeremiah Bentham, attorney-at-law, Red Lion Street, Houndsditch, London, and his first wife Alicia, widow of --- Whitehorne, and sister of George Woodward Grove (qv); b. 15 Feb 1747/8; adm. 1755; (Morel's according Bentham's memoir); elected KS 1759, but remained a Town Boy; left Aug 1760; Queen’s Coll. Oxford, matr. 28 Jun 1760; BA 1764; MA 1767; adm. Lincoln’s Inn 26 Jan 1763, called to bar 6 Nov 1769; did not practise his profession, but resident in chambers in Middle Temple 1766-9, Lincoln’s Inn from 1769; turned his mind to science and to speculations on politics and jurisprudence; his Fragment on Government, a masterly criticism of Blackstone’s Commentaries, appeared anonymously in 1776; friend and protege of Earl of Shelburne (later 1st Marquis of Lansdowne); a successful promoter of law reform and one of the ablest propagandists of the doctrine of utilitarianism; exercised great influence in the fields of ethics and jurisprudence; his published works were collected and edited by Sir John Bowring and John Hill Burton, in an eleven-volume edition published in 1843; his reminiscences of his school-days at Westminster appear in vol. x, 26-35, where it will be seen that his opinion of the instruction, discipline and usages of the School in his day was by no means flattering; two small MS volumes containing school and college exercises by him are preserved in the School Library; d. unm. 6 Jun 1832; his skeleton is preserved at University Coll., London. DNB.

BLACKBURNE, LANCELOT, son of Richard Blackburne, London; b. 10 Dec 1658; adm.; KS 1671; elected to Christ Church, Oxford 1676, matr. 20 Oct 1676, Westminster Student 24 Dec 1676-85 (void); BA 1680; MA (in his absence) 28 Jan 1683/4; ordained 1681; went to Antigua, West Indies, soon after his ordination; a protegé of Sir Jonathan Trelawny, Bart. (q. v. ), Bishop of Exeter; Prebendary of Exeter 15 Jun 1691, Sub-Dean 1695-1702, 1704-5; Rector of Calstock, Cornwall, 29 May 1696 (dispensation to hold with Bishopric of Exeter 1716/7); Vicar of Altarnun, Cornwall, 1699 (dispensation to hold with Calstock, 1699); Dean of Exeter 3 Nov 1705 - Feb 1716/7; Archdeacon of Cornwall 24 Jan 1714/5 - Feb 1716/7 (but dispensation to hold with Bishopric of Exeter, 1716/7 ?); Chaplain in Ordinary to George I (Chamberlayne 1716); DD Lambeth 28 Jan 1716; consecrated Bishop of Exeter 24 Feb 1716/7; Lord Almoner from 26 Oct 1723; Archbishop of York from 8 Nov 1724; Privy Councillor 10 Dec 1724; Busby Trustee from 18 Feb 1725/6; a gay and witty divine of remarkably free manners, which gave rise to many scandalous stories; was described by Horace Walpole as “the jolly old Archbishop of York who had all the manners of a man of quality, though he had been a buccaneer, and was a clergyman; but he retained nothing of his first profession, except his seraglio” (Walpole, Memoirs of the Reign of George II, 1847, i, 87); m. 2 Sep 1684 Catherine, widow of Walter Littleton, Lichfield, Staffs., and dau. of William Talbot, Stourton Castle, Staffs.; d. 23 Mar 1742/3. DNB.

BRETT, WILLIAM BALIOL, 1ST VISCOUNT ESHER, brother of Wilford George Brett (qv); b. 13 Aug 1815; adm. (G) 11 Jan 1830; Gonville and Caius Coll. Cambridge, adm. pens. 25 Jun 1835, matr. Mich. 1835; rowed in Cambridge eight against Leander 1837, 1838, and against Oxford 1839; stroked the Cambridge Subscription Rooms eight which won the Grand Challenge Cup at Henley 1841; BA 1840; MA 1845; adm. Lincoln’s Inn 30 Apr 1839, called to bar 29 Jan 1846, Bencher 1861-8; Northern circuit; QC 22 Feb 1861; contested (Cons) Rochdale 1865; MP (Cons) Helston 5 Jul 1866 - Aug 1868; Solicitor-Gen., 10 Feb - Aug 1868; knighted 29 Feb 1868; Serjeant-at-law; Justice of the Common Pleas 24 Aug 1868-75; Judge of the High Court, Queen’s Bench Division, 1875-6; Lord Justice of Appeal 27 Oct 1876 - Apr 1883; Privy Councillor 28 Nov 1876; Master of the Rolls 3 Apr 1883 - Oct 1897; cr. Baron Esher 24 Jul 1885; cr. Viscount Esher 11 Nov 1897; Hon. Fellow, Gonville and Caius Coll., 7 Oct 1886; a Busby Trustee 18 May 1886 - Jun 1890; m. 3 Apr 1850 Eugénie, only dau. of Louis Mayer, Lyon, France, and step-dau. of Col. John Gurwood CB; d. 24 May 1899. DNB.

BRITTON, JAMES, only son of Rev. James Britton, Head Master of Durham GS, subsequently Vicar of Bossall, Yorkshire North Riding, and Isabella, sister of Henry Forster Mills (qv); b. 25 Oct 1790; in school list 1803; KS (aged 14) 1805; elected to Christ Church, Oxford 1809, matr. 17 May 1809; BA 1813; MA 1815; ordained deacon 6 Mar 1812 (Chester, lit. dim. from York), priest 18 Dec 1814 (York); Curate, Ware, Herts.; Vicar of Great Bardfield, Essex, 17 Jul 1829-40; m. 22 Aug 1818 Julia, dau. of Richard Down, Bartholomew Lane, London, banker; d. 18 May 1871.