Charles Burney FRS (born Lynn Regis, now King's Lynn, Norfolk, 4 December 1757, died at Deptford, then in Kent, 28 December 1817) was an English classical scholar, schoolmaster, clergyman and chaplain to George III. He kept a school for boys in Hammersmith and later Greenwich.
A native of London, he was the son of Charles Burney, a music historian, and his first wife, Esther Sleepe. He was a brother of the novelist and diarist Fanny Burney and the explorer James Burney, and a half-brother of the novelist Sarah Burney.
Burney was educated at Charterhouse School, London, and then at Gonville and Caius College at the University of Cambridge. He was accused of stealing books from the university library to pay debts, and sent down in 1778. He obtained an LLD degree from King's College, Aberdeen in 1781. Burney later collected 13,000 rare books and manuscripts, which he sold to the British Museum in 1817 for £13,500. This Burney Collection is housed in the British Library.
In 1782, Burney became a master at a private school in Chiswick run by William Rose. He married Rose's daughter Sarah (1759–1821) in 1783. When Rose died in 1786, Burney took over the school, moving it to nearby Hammersmith and then to Greenwich in 1793.
Many eminent naval and military officers were educated there, but he seems to have been such a disciplinarian that he provoked a rebellion of about 50 boys at some time in the early years of the 19th century. One boy described it in an undated letter to his mother. The boys took food, chessboards, cards and weapons, and barricaded themselves in: "Then Burney came and told them to open the door but they said it was not shut to be opened. He then got a ladder & got at the top of the door where he could see them all... till at last as the door was going to be cut open they unfastened it, when Burney rushed in. At first they hit him with their sticks but he knocked them about till at last they were quiet & Burney very generously gave them the choice of being expelled or forgiven; above 40 were forgiven and 2 expelled." [1]
Burney transferred the school to his only child Charles Parr Burney (Archdeacon of Colchester) (1785–1864), who ran it from 1813 to 1833.
Burney gained a strong reputation as a Greek scholar with several publications. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1802. He made his peace with Cambridge University, which awarded him an MA in 1808 on his ordination as an Anglican priest. He advanced rapidly in the Church of England, becoming rector of the rich living of Cliffe, Kent, and of St Paul's, Deptford. He also served as a royal chaplain and as a prebendary of Lincoln Cathedral. He died of apoplexy, aged sixty.
There are memorials to Burney in Westminster Abbey, by Sebastian Gahagan, [2] and St Paul's, Deptford, by Lewis Alexander Goblet. [3]
Frances Burney, also known as Fanny Burney and later Madame d'Arblay, was an English satirical novelist, diarist and playwright. In 1786–1790 she held the post of "Keeper of the Robes" to Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, George III's queen. In 1793, aged 41, she married a French exile, General Alexandre d'Arblay. After a long writing career and wartime travels that stranded her in France for over a decade, she settled in Bath, England, where she died on 6 January 1840. The first of her four novels, Evelina (1778), was the most successful and remains her most highly regarded, followed by Cecilia (1782). Most of her stage plays were not performed in her lifetime. She wrote a memoir of her father (1832) and many letters and journals that have been gradually published since 1889, forty-nine years after her death.
King's Lynn, known until 1537 as Bishop's Lynn and colloquially as Lynn, is a port and market town in the borough of King's Lynn and West Norfolk in the county of Norfolk, England. It is 36 miles (58 km) north-east of Peterborough, 44 miles (71 km) north-north-east of Cambridge and 44 miles (71 km) west of Norwich.
Charles Burney was an English music historian, composer and musician. He was the father of the writers Frances Burney and Sarah Burney, of the explorer James Burney, and of Charles Burney, a classicist and book donor to the British Museum. He was a close friend and supporter of Joseph Haydn and other composers.
This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1757.
The Church of St Margaret, Westminster Abbey is in the grounds of Westminster Abbey on Parliament Square, London, England. It is dedicated to Margaret of Antioch, and forms part of a single World Heritage Site with the Palace of Westminster and Westminster Abbey.
The region of Greater London, including the City of London, is divided into 75 parliamentary constituencies which are sub-classified as borough constituencies, affecting the type of electoral officer and level of expenses permitted. Since the general election of July 2024, 59 are represented by Labour MPs, 9 by Conservative MPs, 6 by Liberal Democrat MPs, and 1 by an independent MP.
Charles Ignatius Sancho was a British abolitionist, writer and composer. Born on a slave ship in the Atlantic, Sancho was sold into slavery in the Spanish colony of New Granada. After his parents died, Sancho's owner took the two-year-old orphan to Britain and gifted him to three sisters living in Greenwich, where he remained for eighteen years. Unable to bear being a servant to them, Sancho ran away to the Montagu House in Blackheath where John Montagu, 2nd Duke of Montagu taught him how to read and encouraged Sancho's budding interest in literature. After spending some time as a butler in the household, Sancho left and started his own business as a shopkeeper, while also starting to write and publish various essays, plays and books.
James Burney was an English rear-admiral, who accompanied Captain Cook on his last two voyages. He later wrote two books on naval voyages and a third on the game of whist.
Frances Burney (1776–1828) was an English playwright and governess, named for her famous aunt.
The Kirkman family were English harpsichord and later piano makers of Alsatian origin, active from the 1750s until the late 1800s.
William Vincent was Dean of Westminster from 1802 to 1815.
Sarah Harriet Burney was an English novelist. She was the daughter of the musicologist and composer Charles Burney and half-sister of the novelist and diarist Frances Burney. She had some intermittent success with her novels.
Julia Charlotte Maitland, née Barrett, first married name Thomas, was an English writer and traveller, and the grandniece of the novelists Fanny Burney and Sarah Burney. She and her husband ran a boys' school in India, while strongly advocating a national system of education for the country.
William Seward was an English man of letters, known for his collections of anecdotes. he was closely acquainted in London with Samuel Johnson, the Thrales and the Burneys.
Dr William Rose (1719–1786) was a Scottish schoolmaster and classical scholar.
The following is a timeline of the history of London, the capital of England and the United Kingdom.
George Somes Layard (1857–1925) was an English barrister, journalist and man of letters. He was the third son of Sarah and Charles Clement Layard, rector of Combe Hay in Somerset, born at Clifton, Bristol; Nina Frances Layard was his sister. He was educated at Harrow School and Monkton Combe School. Matriculating to Trinity College, Cambridge in 1876, he graduated B.A. in 1881, and was called to the bar that year at the Inner Temple, which he had joined in 1877. He married Eleanor Byng Gribble. The psychologist John Willoughby Layard was their second child.
Marianne Francis (1790–1832) was an English evangelical, now known principally as a correspondent of Hester Piozzi and Sarah Wesley. She has been called an "evangelical bluestocking", and is recognised as a significant participant in debate about religious enthusiasm.
Susanna Elizabeth Burney, later known as Susan Phillips, was an English letter and journal writer. She wrote 650,000 words and her letters are said to be "the most important source on opera in the period".
This is a list of coats of arms of London.
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