D.W. Wilkin's Blog, page 7
December 22, 2016
Conclusion of the Trolling Series-We’ll All Go A Trolling
We’ll All Go A Trolling Not only do I write Regency and Romance, but I also have delved into Fantasy.
The Trolling series is the story of a man, Humphrey. We meet him as he has left youth and become a man with a man’s responsibilities.
We follow him in a series of stories that encompass the stages of life. We see him when he starts his family, when he has older sons and the father son dynamic is tested.
We see him when his children begin to marry and have children, and at the end of his life when those he has loved, and those who were his friends proceed him over the threshold into death.
All this while he serves a kingdom troubled by monsters. Troubles that he and his friends will learn to deal with and rectify. It is now available in a variety of formats.
For $2.99 you can get this fantasy adventure.
Barnes and Noble for your Nook
King Humphrey, retired, has his 80th birthday approaching. An event that he is not looking forward to.
A milestone, of course, but he has found traveling to Torc, the capital of the Valley Kingdom of Torahn, a trial. He enjoys his life in the country, far enough from the center of power where his son Daniel now is King and rules.
Peaceful days sitting on the porch. Reading, writing, passing the time with his guardsmen, his wife, and the visits of his grandson who has moved into a manor very near.
Why go to Torc where he was to be honored, but would certainly have a fight with his son, the current king. The two were just never going to see eye to eye, and Humphrey, at the age of 80, was no longer so concerned with all that happened to others.
He was waiting for his audience with the Gods where all his friends had preceded him. It would be his time soon enough.
Yet, the kingdom wanted him to attend the celebrations, and there were to be many. So many feasts and fireworks he could not keep track, but the most important came at the end, when word was brought that the Trolls were attacking once more.
Now Humphrey would sit as regent for his son, who went off to fight the ancient enemy. Humphrey had ruled the kingdom before, so it should not have been overwhelming, but at eighty, even the little things could prove troublesome.
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December 21, 2016
Regency Personalities Series-John Buonarotti Papworth
Regency Personalities Series
In my attempts to provide us with the details of the Regency (I include those who were born before 1811 and who died after 1795), today I continue with one of the many period notables.
John Buonarotti Papworth
24 January 1775 – 16 June 1847
John Buonarotti Papworth
John Buonarotti Papworth was born in Marylebone, London, in 1775 to John Papworth and his wife Charlotte (née Searle). He was one of twelve children and the second of six sons. His father described himself as an “architect, plasterer and builder”. His background was in decorative plasterwork, and he dominated the trade in London, employing more than 500 men.
At the recommendation of Sir William Chambers he spent two years as a pupil of the architect John Plaw and was then apprenticed to the builder Thomas Wapshott, whose daughter Jane he then married.
John Summerson described Papworth as “one of the most versatile architects and decorative artists of the period”. He contributed designs to Ackermann’s Repository of the Arts for almost 20 years, and published some of his designs for houses as Designs for Rural Residences in 1818. In London he designed shop fronts (one, for a tea merchant in Ludgate Hill, was in a “Chinese” style) and warehouses, and built or remodelled many villas for middle-class clients in the countryside. At Cheltenham he laid out the Montpellier Estate, and extended the Montpellier Pump Room (1825–26), with a domed rotunda inspired by the Pantheon.
In 1827 William Bullock commissioned Papworth to plan the layout and design various classes of building for a new city to be called “Hygeia” in the United States, on land he had bought stretching about two-and-a-half miles along the Ohio River, opposite Cincinnati. Bullock published the plans, hoping to attract purchasers for the plots, but the scheme came to nothing.
He exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1816 and 1841. His address is given as Bath Place, New Road, London, until 1816, and 10 Caroline Street, Bedford Square, from 1823. In the latter year he is described as “Architect to the King of Wirtemberg”, and exhibited a design for a “Palace at Canstadt for the King of Wirtemberg”.
In 1838 he became director of the newly-established Government School of Design.
His archive of drawings is in the Royal Institute of British Architects Drawings and Archives Collections.
He had two sons, John Woody Papworth, and Wyatt Papworth. His brother George Papworth acted as his clerk of works until 1804 and then practised as an architect in Ireland.
Mansion for the Earl of Lucan at Laleham, Middlesex (1806)
Factory at 69 Holborn, London, for the engineer Alexander Galloway
St Julien’s, a cottage orné near Sevenoaks, for Robert Herries
Villa (later known as Leigham House) on Brixton Hill, Surrey (now South London) for George Fuller. Demolished 1908.
Gallery of the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly, London, for William Bullock (1819)
Refurbishment of Boodle’s Club, St James’s Street, London (1821–34)
St Bride’s Avenue, London (1823–30)
Rebuilding of 96 Strand, London, for Rudolf Ackermann
94 Holborn Hill, London, “the first of the gin-palaces”
Montpellier Pump Room Rotunda and Gardens, Cheltenham (1825–26) for Pearson Thompson.
Lansdown Place and Lansdown Crescent, Cheltenham, for RW and C Jearrad (1825–29)
St James’s Church, Cheltenham (1826–32), more recently a Zizi Pizza restaurant
Plans for Hygeia, a utopian community on the Ohio River, for William Bullock (1827)
Alterations to Basildon Park’s Palladian mansion and grounds for James Morrison (after 1838)
St Mary of the Visitation Church in Killybegs, County Donegal, designed between 1834 and 1839
RAP has The End of the World
The End of the World This is the first of the Regency Romances I published. It is available for sale and I hope that you will take the opportunity to order your copy.
For yourself or as a gift. It is now available in a variety of formats. And now at the reduced price of $3.99 you can get this Regency Romance for your eReader. A little more as an actual physical book.
Barnes and Noble for your Nook
Amazon for your Kindle and as a Trade Paperback
Hermione Merwyn leads a pleasant, quiet life with her father, in the farthest corner of England. All is as it should be, though change is sure to come. For she and her sister have reached the age of marriage, but that can be no great adventure when life at home has already been so bountiful.
When Samuel Lynchhammer arrives in Cornwall, having journeyed the width of the country, he is down to his last few quid and needs to find work for his keep. Spurned by the most successful mine owner in the county, Gavin Tadcaster, Samuel finds work for Gavin’s adversary, Sir Lawrence Merwyn.
Can working for Sir Lawrence, the father of two young women on the cusp of their first season to far away London, be what Samuel needs to help him resolve the reasons for his running away from his obligations in the east of the country?
Will the daughters be able to find happiness in the desolate landscapes and deadly mines of their home? When a stranger arrives in Cornwall while the war rages on the Peninsula, is he the answer to one’s prayers, or a nightmare wearing the disguise of a gentleman?
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December 20, 2016
Regency Personalities Series-Thomas Erskine 1st Baron Erskine
Regency Personalities Series
In my attempts to provide us with the details of the Regency (I include those who were born before 1811 and who died after 1795), today I continue with one of the many period notables.
Thomas Erskine 1st Baron Erskine
10 January 1750 – 17 November 1823
Thomas Erskine
Thomas Erskine 1st Baron Erskine was the third and youngest surviving son of Henry Erskine, 10th Earl of Buchan, and was born in a tenement at the head of South Grays Close on the High Street in Edinburgh. His older brothers were David (Lord Cardross and later the 11th Earl of Buchan) and Henry (later Lord Advocate of Scotland). His mother, Agnes Steuart, was the daughter of a solicitor general for Scotland and undertook much of her children’s education as the family, though noble, were not rich. The family moved to St Andrews, where they could live more cheaply, and Erskine attended the grammar school there. The family’s money having been spent on the education of his older brothers, Erskine, aged fourteen, reluctantly abandoned his formal education for the time being and went to sea as a midshipman. His family meanwhile moved to Bath to become members of the Methodist community headed by Selina, Countess of Huntingdon. One of Erskine’s sisters, Anne Agnes, was to become treasurer of Selina, Countess of Huntingdon’s charities.
Erskine went to sea as a midshipman in the Tartar, under captain Sir David Lindsay, who was a nephew of Lord Mansfield and a friend of the Erskine family. The Tartar set sail for the Caribbean, where Erskine was to spend the next four years, rising to the rank of acting lieutenant. When Erskine was eighteen he resigned from the Navy. His ship had been paid off, there were no commissions available, and he didn’t want to return to sea as a midshipman after having been an acting lieutenant. The 10th Earl of Buchan had recently died, and Erskine now had just enough money to buy a commission in the army, becoming an ensign in the 1st (Royal) Regiment of Foot. He was stationed first at Berwick and then on Jersey. On 29 March 1770 Erskine married Frances Moore at Gretna Green, against the wishes of her father, Daniel Moore who was member of parliament for Great Marlowe. Frances was the granddaughter of John Moore, who had been attorney general of Pennsylvania. Erskine’s regiment was then posted to Minorca, and Frances went with him. Before meeting Frances, Erskine had written about the qualities he was looking for in a bride: “Let then my ornament be far from the tinsel glare, let it be fair yet modest, let it rather delight than dazzle, rather shine like the mild beams of the morning than the blaze of the noon. I seek in my fair one a winning female softness both in person and mind”. Erskine appears to have found these qualities in Frances: she is described on her memorial in Hampstead Church as “the most faithful and affectionate of women”. The couple had four sons and four daughters.
While he was stationed in Jersey and Minorca, Erskine had on occasion preached sermons to his men, prompting one biographer to say that “a taste for oratory that ultimately would lead on to his true career originated in those soldier sermons”.
He also demonstrated his future skills as an advocate in a pamphlet entitled “Observations on the Prevailing Abuses in the British Army Arising from the Corruption of Civil Government with a Proposal toward Obtaining an Addition to Their Pay“.
Whilst on leave in London in 1772, the charming and well-connected young officer was able to mix in literary circles and met Dr Johnson. James Boswell, in his Life of Johnson, recalled meeting “a young officer in the regimentals of the Scots royal, who talked with a vivacity, fluency and precision so uncommon, that he attracted particular attention. He proved to be the Honorable Thomas Erskine, youngest brother to the Earl of Buchan, who has since risen into such brilliant reputation at the Bar in Westminster-hall”. Although Erskine was appointed a lieutenant in April 1773, he decided to leave the army and, with the encouragement of his family and Lord Mansfield, study for the Bar.
Erskine was admitted as a student of Lincoln’s Inn on 26 April 1775. He discovered that the period of study required before being called to the Bar could be reduced from five years to three for holders of a degree from Oxford or Cambridge universities. He therefore on 13 January 1776 entered himself as a gentleman commoner on the books of Trinity College, Cambridge where, as the son of an earl, he was entitled to gain a degree without sitting any examinations. He did however win the English declamation prize for an oration on the “glorious revolution” of 1688. At the same time, he was a pupil in the chambers of first Francis Buller and then George Wood. These were years of poverty for Erskine and his growing family: he installed Frances and the children in cheap lodgings in Kentish Town and survived on a gift of £300 from a relative, and the sale of his army commission. Jeremy Bentham, who knew Erskine at this time, described him as “so shabbily dressed as to be quite remarkable”.
In the summer of 1778 Erskine was awarded a degree and was called to the Bar on 3 July. While many newly qualified barristers, especially those without contacts to put briefs their way, took years to establish themselves, Erskine’s success was immediate and brilliant. His first case, that of Thomas Baillie, came to him by chance. The case involved the Greenwich Hospital for Seamen, of which Captain Baillie was lieutenant-governor. Baillie had uncovered abuses in the management of the hospital and, having failed to interest the directors and governors of the hospital or the lords of the Admiralty, he published a pamphlet and was then sued by the agents of John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich who was first lord of the Admiralty and had been placing his agents in positions of authority in the hospital. Hearing of a newly qualified barrister who had himself been a seaman and was sympathetic to his cause, Baillie appointed Erskine to his team although he already had four counsel. Erskine was the most junior, but it was his brilliant speech that won the case and exonerated Baillie. Despite a warning from the judge, Erskine attacked Lord Sandwich calling him “the dark mover behind the scene of iniquity”. After his success in the Baillie case, Erskine had no shortage of work and a few months later was retained by Admiral Augustus Keppel in his court martial at Portsmouth. Keppel was acquitted and gave Erskine £1,000 in gratitude. For the first time in his life Erskine was financially secure.
In 1781 Erskine had his first opportunity to address a jury when he defended Lord George Gordon who had been charged with high treason for instigating the anti-Catholic riots of 1780. Erskine’s defence not only achieved Gordon’s acquittal but also dealt a blow to the English legal doctrine of constructive treason. The case established Erskine as the country’s most successful barrister. By 1783, when he received a patent of precedence, he had earnt enough to pay off all his debts and accumulate £8–9,000. He could afford a country house, Evergreen Villa, in Hampstead as well as a house in Lincoln’s Inn Fields.
In 1783, when the Fox-North Coalition came into power, Erskine entered parliament as Whig member for Portsmouth. Erskine’s friend Charles James Fox had been eager to have such a brilliant lawyer join the ranks of Whig members, but Erskine’s speeches failed to make the impact in parliament that they did in court. Erskine lost his seat the following year in the general election, becoming one of “Fox’s martyrs” when Pitt’s party made large gains, although he would regain the seat in 1790.
The loss of his parliamentary seat enabled Erskine to concentrate on his legal practice. In 1786, when he was thirty-six years old and had been practising at the Bar for only eight years, he was able to write: “I continue highly successful in my profession, being now, I may say, as high as I can go at the Bar. The rest depends on politics, which at present are adverse.” Amongst his notable cases in 1780s was his successful defence of William Davies Shipley, dean of St Asaph (and son of Jonathan Shipley) who was tried in 1784 at Shrewsbury for seditious libel for publishing Principles of Government, in a Dialogue between a Gentleman and a Farmer, a tract by his brother-in-law Sir William Jones advancing radical views on the relationship between subjects and the state. Erskine’s defence anticipated the Libel Act 1792, which laid down the principle that it is for the jury (who previously had only decided the question of publication) and not the judge to decide whether or not a publication is a libel.
In 1789 he was counsel for John Stockdale, a bookseller, who was charged with seditious libel in publishing John Logan’s pamphlet in support of Warren Hastings, whose impeachment was then proceeding. Erskine’s speech, which resulted in the Stockdale’s acquittal, argued that a defendant should not be convicted if his composition, taken as a whole, did not go beyond a free and fair discussion, even if selected passages might be libellous. Henry Brougham considered this to be one of Erskine’s finest speeches: “It is justly regarded, by all English lawyers, as a consummate specimen of the art of addressing a jury”.
Three years later he would, against the advice of his friends, take on the defence of Thomas Paine who had been charged with seditious libel after the publication of the second part of his Rights of Man. Paine was tried in his absence; he was in France. Erskine argued for the right of a people to criticise, reform and change its government; he made the point that a free press produces security in the government. But in this case his arguments failed to convince the special jury, who returned a verdict of guilty without even retiring.
Erskine’s speech is also remembered for a passage on the duty of barristers to take on even unpopular cases:
“I will for ever, at all hazards, assert the dignity, independence, and integrity of the English Bar, without which impartial justice, the most valuable part of the English constitution, can have no existence. From the moment that any advocate can be permitted to say that he will or will not stand between the Crown and the subject arraigned in the court where he daily sits to practise, from that moment the liberties of England are at an end.”
Erskine’s decision to defend Paine cost him his position as attorney-general (legal advisor) to the Prince of Wales, to which he had been appointed in 1786.
In 1794 William Pitt’s government, fearful of a revolution, decided to take action against people who were campaigning for parliamentary reform. Habeas corpus was suspended and twelve members of radical societies were imprisoned and charged with a variety of offences amounting to high treason. Erskine and Vicary Gibbs were assigned as counsel to seven of them. They were not paid for their services, as it was considered unprofessional to take fees for defending people charged with high treason. The treason trials began on 28 October before Lord Chief Justice Eyre at the Old Bailey with the trial of Thomas Hardy, a shoemaker and secretary of the London Corresponding Society. After eight days of evidence and speeches, including Erskine’s seven-hour speech on the final day, and several hours deliberation, the jury returned a verdict of not guilty. Erskine was hailed as a hero by the crowds outside who unharnessed his horses (which he never saw again ) and pulled his carriage through the streets. Although it was usual in cases where several people were jointly charged with high treason to discharge the rest if the first was acquitted, the government persisted with the trials of John Horne Tooke and John Thelwall. They too, defended by Erskine and Vicary Gibbs, were acquitted and it was only then that the prosecution was halted. A disappointed government had to scrap a further 800 warrants of arrest.
Notable amongst the later cases of Erskine’s career was that of James Hadfield, a former soldier who had fired a shot at the king in Drury Lane Theatre. The shot missed and Hadfield was charged with treason. Erskine called a large number of witnesses who testified to Hadfield’s sometimes bizarre behaviour, a surgeon who testified to the nature of the head injuries that Hadfield had sustained in battle, and a doctor, Alexander Crichton, who gave evidence that Hadfield was insane. Erskine argued that, although Hadfield could appear rational, he was in the grip of a delusion and could not control his actions. He summed up: “I must convince you, not only that the unhappy prisoner was a lunatic, within my own definition of lunacy, but that the act in question was the immediate unqualified offspring of the disease”. The judge, Lord Kenyon, was convinced by Erskine’s evidence and argument and stopped the trial, acquitted Hadfield and ordered him to be detained. The trial led to two acts of parliament: the Criminal Lunatics Act 1800 which provided for the detention of people who were acquitted of a crime by reason of insanity, and the Treason Act 1800.
In 1806 Erskine was offered the Lord Chancellorship in the Ministry of All the Talents formed by Lord Grenville and Charles Fox on the death of William Pitt. Fox’s original plan had been to offer Erskine the chief judgeship of the Common Pleas or the King’s Bench when one of the holders was elevated to Lord Chancellor. But both Lord Ellenborough, chief justice of the King’s Bench and Sir James Mansfield, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, declined the chancellorship. Erskine was therefore appointed although he had no experience in Chancery. He was created a peer to become Lord Chancellor. The Prince of Wales, who had inherited the Duchy of Cornwall, chose Erskine’s title, Baron Erskine of Restormel Castle, while the motto, “trial by jury” was Erskine’s own. Frances Erskine did not live to enjoy the title of Lady Erskine; she died a few weeks before her husband took the seals of office.
Although Erskine lacked experience in equity, only one of the judgements he made during his brief tenure as Lord Chancellor was appealed against and that, concerning Peter Thellusson’s will, was upheld. His handling of the impeachment of Lord Melville was generally admired. Along with Lords Grenville, Spencer and Ellenborough, Erskine was commissioned by the king to enquire into the morals of his daughter-in-law Caroline of Brunswick in what became known as the “delicate investigation”.
Erskine was Lord Chancellor for only fourteen months, having to give up the seals of office when the ministry of all the talents resigned over a disagreement with the king concerning the question of Catholic Emancipation. The king gave Erskine a week to finish pending cases, and Erskine took advantage of this to appoint one of his sons-in-law, Edward Morris, as master of Chancery.
As ex-chancellor, Erskine was not permitted to return to the Bar. He was awarded a pension of £4000 a year and remained a member of the House of Lords. He was only 57 when the ministry of all the talents fell, and hoped that he might return to office when the Prince of Wales became regent. In the event, however, the regent retained the ministry of Spencer Perceval and the Whigs would not be in power again until 1830, seven years after Erskine’s death. Erskine largely retired from public life, rarely speaking in the House of Lords. In 1818 he married for the second time. His bride was a former apprentice bonnet-maker, Sarah Buck, with whom he had already had two children. The couple travelled to Gretna Green for the marriage, with an angry adult son in hot pursuit. It was a tempestuous relationship, and the marriage ended in separation a few years later. In spite of his generous pension and the enormous sums he had earnt at the Bar, Erskine experienced financial difficulties in his later years, having to sell his villa in Hampstead and move to a house in Pimlico. He also bought an estate in Sussex, but his agricultural efforts were not a great success. He wrote a political romance, Armata, which ran to several editions.
Causes which Erskine took up in his retirement were animal rights, Greek independence, and the defence of Queen Caroline. He had always been an animal lover; amongst his favourite animals were a Newfoundland dog called Toss who used to accompany him to chambers, a macaw, a goose and two leeches. He introduced a bill in the House of Lords for the prevention of cruelty to animals, arguing that humanity’s dominion over them was given by God as a moral trust. It was the first time he had proposed a change in the law. The bill was accepted in the Lords but opposed in the Commons; William Windham arguing that a law against cruelty to animals was incompatible with fox-hunting and horse racing. Eventually the bill was introduced in the Commons and passed as statute 3 Geo 4 c71. When Caroline was being prosecuted for divorce Erskine spoke against the Bill of Pains and Penalties and, when the government dropped the bill, expressed his approval: “My Lords, I am an old man, and my life, whether it has been for good or evil, has been passed under the sacred rule of Law. In this moment I feel my strength renovated by that rule being restored”. He was invited to a public dinner in Edinburgh in February 1820, and made his first trip to Scotland since he had left it on the Tartar over fifty years before.
In 1823 Erskine set out by sea on another visit to Scotland with one of his sons, hoping to see his brother the Earl of Buchan. But he became ill with a chest infection on the journey and was put ashore at Scarborough. He managed to travel to the home of his brother Henry’s widow in Almondell in West Lothian, where they were joined by the earl. He died at Almondell on 17 November 1823 and was buried in the family burial-place at Uphall in Linlithgowshire. His widow survived him by over thirty years. She, as reports in the Times revealed, was reduced to poverty and had to rely on a small charitable allowance to survive. Even these meagre payments were withheld by Erskine’s executors when she tried to prevent them sending her son Hampden away to school, and she had to appeal to the lord mayor of London. She died in 1856.
Erskine’s first marriage produced four sons and four daughters:
David Montagu Erskine (1776–1855) was a member of parliament and diplomat;
Henry David (1786–1859) was Dean of Ripon;
Thomas (1788–1864) became a judge of the Court of Common Pleas;
Esmé Steuart (1789–1817) fought at the Battle of Waterloo where he lost an arm (his widow Eliza married Admiral James Norton, who also lost an arm in action).
Frances (d. 1859) married Samuel Holland, Precentor of Chichester and Rector of Poynings, Sussex (a grandson of Frances and Samuel was Thomas Erskine Holland the jurist);
Elizabeth (d, 1800) married her cousin Captain (later Sir) David Erskine, the illegitimate son of the 11th Earl of Buchan;
Mary (d. 1804) married lawyer Edward Morris.
With his second wife Erskine had one legitimate son, Hampden (b. 1821) and two children, Agnes and Erskine, born before the marriage.
Erskine’s eldest brother the 11th Earl of Buchan had no legitimate sons and was succeeded by a nephew, the son of Erskine’s brother Henry. When all Henry’s descendants in the direct male line died out in 1960 the seventh Baron Erskine (Donald Cardross Flower Erskine, Erskine’s great-great-greatgrandson) became the sixteenth Earl of Buchan.
You Ought to Trust Your Mother (YOTTYM) now released
Now available the next Regency Romance tale by D.W. Wilkin:
Beauty has been said to be in the eye of the Beholder, or is it the Beholden.
The tale of Baron Fallion Lancelot Stafford, a gentleman of perhaps too much leisure who has served in the wars of some few years before. He now has decided that all this leisure is perhaps a waste and he should be doing something. He was just very unsure what that was.
We also find Lady Beatrice Cavendish, the daughter of the Earl of Hoare who is famed for her beauty, yet cannot find any man who has more to speak to her beyond that one subject. And yet far too many think they should offer for her with only the ardent praise to her looks to recommend them. Perhaps there exists one suitor who could speak on a subject beyond that?
In the rush of the Season of 1821, where their most intimate friends have all come to the conclusion that they should marry, can Beatrice put aside her willful ways and hear sound thoughts that her mama has said on that particular subject? Beatrice was sure that her mother would be content if she accepted the Baron Tweedglen, or any of a dozen other men of good breeding, position, or wealth. Whether they had ought to speak on her attractiveness, and no other words would leave their mouths.
Certainly a marriage with such foundations was doomed to crumble once age advanced and liver spots or wrinkles appeared. Yet amongst the Ton, such marriages were often deemed successes. Would they be so for Beatrice, though? That was something she was destined to apply her own thoughts to.
For Baron Tweedglen, the haunting memory of the war caused him to avoid any reference to his time spent prosecuting that undertaking. Such deamons as consumed his psyche, were magnified as his desire was for a world that art flourished and certainly his experience had been the exact opposite of such an inclination. The Baron was desperately in need of something that could save him from his own self. Was there a remedy in marriage as the entire Ton seemed to believe?
Now available on Amazon for $15.99…
also available for your Kindle and Kindle Reading Apps for $3.99
for those who have iPads, Nooks, or other devices, the book is also available at:
The Apple iBookstore, Barnes and Noble Nook store, Kobo, and Smashwords for $3.99 as well.
December 19, 2016
Regency Personalities Series-Armar Lowry-Corry 3rd Earl Belaure
Regency Personalities Series
In my attempts to provide us with the details of the Regency (I include those who were born before 1811 and who died after 1795), today I continue with one of the many period notables.
Armar Lowry-Corry 3rd Earl Belaure
28 December 1801 – 17 December 1845
Armar Lowry-Corry 3rd Earl Belaure was the eldest son of Somerset Lowry-Corry, 2nd Earl Belmore and his wife Lady Juliana Butler. His younger brother was Henry Thomas Lowry-Corry, who served as First Lord of the Admiralty under Lord Derby and Benjamin Disraeli.
He studied at Christ Church, Oxford and was the Tory Member of Parliament for County Fermanagh from 1823 to 1831 and was appointed High Sheriff of County Fermanagh in 1832.
Lord Belmore married Emily Louise Shepherd, youngest daughter and co-heiress of William Shepherd, of Brabourne, Kent, by his wife Anne Lovel Dawson, daughter of Thomas Dawson, of Edwardstone Hall, Suffolk, and had issue:
Somerset Lowry-Corry, 4th Earl Belmore
Admiral Hon. Armar Lowry-Corry RN (25 May 1836 – 1 August 1919), who was married on 8 February 1868 to Geraldine King-King (d. 8 January 1905), fifth daughter of James King-King MP, of Staunton Park, Hereford, by his wife Mary Cochrane Mackenzie, fourth daughter of Kenneth Francis Mackenzie, and had issue
Hon. Frederick Cecil George Lowry-Corry (24 June 1839 – 12 May 1855)
Colonel Hon. Henry William Lowry-Corry (30 June 1845 – 6 May 1927), who was married on 21 September 1876 to Hon. Blanche Edith Wood (d. 21 July 1921), third daughter of Charles Wood, 1st Viscount Halifax, by his wife Lady Mary Grey, fifth daughter of Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey, and had issue
Lord Belmore died on 17 December 1845 aged 43 and was succeeded by his eldest son. Lady Belmore died in 1904.
Space Opera Books Presents Trolling, Trolling, Trolling Fly Hides
Trolling, Trolling, Trolling Fly Hides!
Not only do I write Regency and Romance, but I also have delved into Fantasy.
The Trolling series, (the first three are in print) is the story of a man, Humphrey. We meet him as he has left youth and become a man with a man’s responsibilities.
We follow him in a series of stories that encompass the stages of life. We see him when he starts his family, when he has older sons and the father son dynamic is tested.
We see him when his children begin to marry and have children, and at the end of his life when those he has loved, and those who were his friends proceed him over the threshold into death. All this while he serves a kingdom troubled by monsters.
Troubles that he and his friends will learn to deal with and rectify.
It is now available in a variety of formats. For $2.99 you can get this fantasy adventure.
Barnes and Noble for your Nook
Old age is catching up to Humphrey and his friends. He feels it in his bones and with his son and heir having reached the prime of his life, it could very well be time to pass the baton of rule to Daniel.With the Valley Kingdom of Torahn at Peace, that would not be a terrible thing to do. Though breaking his decision to his wife Gwendolyn, the Queen, might be the hardest battle that he ever would fight.
Even as the life of retirement looks to be attractive and possible, however, the Valley Kingdom is beset again. Not Goblins, Trolls, Giants or Men, this time. No. That Humphrey knew would be far too easy.
Those obstacles had been overcome before and the problems they presented had solutions that the army of Torahn was trained to deal with. No, of all the creatures that came forth from Teantellen that they had beaten, the one they had never faced now came forth. Dragons!
Who in the realm knew how to fight these mythical beasts? Was there even away to do so?
Now Humphrey who had thought to spend the remainder of his days quietly writing his memoirs and drinking, was faced with the greatest challenge he had ever known.
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December 18, 2016
Regency Personalities Series-John Burrell (Entomologist)
Regency Personalities Series
In my attempts to provide us with the details of the Regency (I include those who were born before 1811 and who died after 1795), today I continue with one of the many period notables.
John Burrell (Entomologist)
September 1762–1825
John Burrell was the son of another John Burrell, whom he eventually succeeded as Rector of Letheringsett, Norfolk, and the grandson of John Holmes, for thirty years Master of Holt School, Burrell was baptised at Letheringsett on 20 September 1762. He was educated by James Smith at Holt School before being admitted to the lists of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, on 6 July 1779. He matriculated in 1781, graduated BA in 1785, and proceeded to MA in 1791. On 22 May 1785 he was ordained a deacon at Norwich and a few months later, on 18 December, became a priest of the Church of England. In 1786 he succeeded his father as Rector and patron of Letheringsett, a benefice he held until his death.
Burrell published a Prodromus lepidopterorum Britannicorum and several papers on the moths, beetles, and true bugs of Norfolk. He was a Fellow of the Linnean Society and a Fellow of the Entomological Society of London. He contributed three papers to the first volume (1812) of the Transactions of this society.
Burrell was a close friend of John Curtis, William Kirby, Simon Wilkin, and William Spence, who all shared his interest in entomology.
RAP (Regency Assembly Press) in need of Beta-Readers
Regency Assembly
Press
is looking for
Beta Readers
One novel is ready for Beta Reading
We have a continuation of Pride and Prejudice with Ms Caroline Bingley and her fortune at stake:
Do we think that Mr Hurst married his Bingley Bride without incentive? It is highly probable that Caroline Bingley, even though she has a sharp, acerbic tongue, still is in possession of a fortune and an astute fortune hunter who deciphers this may soon be on the road to, if not a happy marriage, one with financial security.
Please respond or send an email if you are interested
An Unofficial Guide to how to win the Scenarios of Wild the 2nd Expansion for Rollercoaster Tycoon 3
An Unofficial Guide to how to win the Scenarios of Wild
I have been a fan of this series of computer games since early in its release of the very first game. That game was done by one programmer, Chris Sawyer, and it was the first I recall of an internet hit. Websites were put up in dedication to this game where people showed off their creations, based on real amusement parks. These sites were funded by individuals, an expense that was not necessarily as cheap then as it is now. Nor as easy to program then as it might be to build a web page now.
Prima Books released game guides for each iteration of the game, Rollercoaster Tycoon 1, Rollercoaster Tycoon 2 and Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 (RCT3) but not for the expansion sets. And unlike the first two works, the third guide was riddle with incorrect solutions. As I played the game that frustrated me. And I took to the forums that Atari, the game publisher hosted to see if I could find a way to solve those scenarios that the Prima Guide had written up in error. Not finding any good advice, I created my own for the scenarios that the “Official” Guide had gotten wrong.
Solutions that if you followed my advice you would win the scenario and move on. But if you followed the “Official” version you would fail and not be able to complete the game. My style and format being different than the folks at Prima, I continued for all the Scenarios that they had gotten right as well, though my solutions cut to the chase and got you to the winner’s circle more quickly, more directly.
My contributions to the “Official” Forum, got me a place as a playtester for both expansions to the game, Soaked and Wild. And for each of these games, I wrote the guides during the play testing phase so all the play testers could solve the scenarios, and then once again after the official release to make changes in the formula in case our aiding to perfect the game had changed matters. For this, Atari and Frontier (the actual programmers of the game) placed me within the game itself.
And for the longest time, these have been free at the “Official” Forums, as well as my own website dedicated to the game. But a short time ago, I noticed that Atari, after one of its bankruptcies had deleted their forums. So now I am releasing the Guide for one and all. I have added new material and it is near 100 pages, just for the first of the three games. It is available for the Kindle at present for $2.99.
(Click on the picture to purchase)
Not only are all 12 Scenarios covered, but there are sections covering every Cheat Code, Custom Scenery, the famous Small Park Competition, the Advanced Fireworks Editor, the Flying Camera Route Editor which are all the techniques every amusement park designer needs to make a fantastic park in Rollercoaster Tycoon 3.
Scenarios for WILD!
1) Scrub Gardens
2) Ostrich Farms Plains
3) Egyptian Sand Dance
4) A Rollercoaster Odyssey
5) Zoo Rescue
6) Mine Mountain
7) Insect World
8) Rocky Coasters
9) Lost Land of the Dinosaurs
10) Tiger Forest
11) Raiders of the Lost Coaster
12) Saxon Farms
