User:Brichcja/Chauncy Hare Townshend
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Chauncy Hare Townshend (born 10 April 1798, Godalming, Surrey; died 25 February 1868) was an 18th century English poet, clergyman, mesmerist, collector, dilettante and hypochondriac. He is mostly remembered for bequeathing his collections to the South Kensington Museum (now the Victoria and Albert museum) and the Wisbech and Fenland Museum in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire. He was born Chauncy Hare Townsend, without an 'h' in his surname, but added one upon inheriting. For simplicity, this article uses the version with it.
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[edit] Early life
Townshend was the only son of Henry Hare Townsnd, whose maternal grandfather was Henry Hare, 3rd Baron Coleraine, and whose father (and thus Chauncy's grandfather) was James Townsend M.P., Lord Mayor of London from 1772 - 1773. They were a wealthy family, with lands in Norfolk, London and Switzerland, and the young Chauncy was educated at Eton College and Trinity Hall, Cambridge. He graduated with B.A. in 1821 and M.A. in 1824, and won the Chancellor's Gold Medal in 1817 for his poem Jerusalem.
[edit] Life as a poet
Townshend met the poet Robert Southey in 1815, and through him met the Wordsworths and Coleridges. Two volumes of poetry were published in the 1820s, and he also had a famous encounter with the poet John Clare.
During the summer of 1821, Clare gave up his agricultural labours almost entirely. The greater part of the time he spent in roaming through woods and fields, planning new poems, and correcting those already made. Visits to Stamford, also, were frequent and of some duration, and he not unfrequently stayed three or four days together at the house of Mr. Gilchrist, or of Mr. Drury. The stream of visitors to Helpston had ceased, to a great extent, and the few that dropped in now and then were mostly of the better class, or at least not belonging to the vulgar-curious element. Among the number was Mr. Chauncey Hare Townsend, a dandyfied poet of some note, particularly gifted in madrigals and pastorals. He came all the way from London to see Clare, and having taken a guide from Stamford to Helpston, was utterly amazed, on his arrival, to find that the cottage, beautifully depicted in the ' Village Minstrel,' was not visible anywhere. His romantic scheme had been to seek Clare in his home, which he thought easy with the picture in his pocket ; and having stepped over the flower-clad porch, to rush inside, with tenderly-dignified air, and drop into the arms of the brother poet. However, the scheme threatened to be frustrated, for though the village could easily be surveyed at a glance, such a cottage as that delineated in the ' Minstrel,' with more regard to the ideal than the real, was nowhere to be seen. In his perplexity, Mr. Chauncey Hare Townsend inquired of a passer-by the way to Clare's house. The individual whom he addressed was a short, thick-set man, and, as Mr. Hare Townsend thought, decidedly ferocious- looking; he was bespattered with mud all over, and a thick knotted stick, which he carried in his hands, gave him something of the air of a highwayman. To the intense surprise of Mr. Chauncey Hare Townsend, this very vulgar person, when addressed, declared that he himself was John Clare, and offered to show the way to his house. Of course, the gentleman from London was too shrewd to be taken in by such a palpable device for being robbed ; so declining the offer with thanks, and recovering from his fright by inhaling the perfume of his pocket handkerchief, he retreated on his path, seeking refuge in the ' Blue Bell ' public house. The landlord's little girl was ready to show the way to Clare's cottage, and did so, leaving the stranger at the door. Mr. Townsend, now fairly prepared to fall into the arms of the brother poet, though not liking the look of his residence, cautiously opened the door ; but started back immediately on beholding the highwayman in the middle of the room, sipping a basin of broth. There seemed a horrible conspiracy for the destruction of a literary gentleman from London in this Northamptonshire village. Mrs. Clare, fortunately, intervened at the nick of time to keep Mr. Townsend from fainting. Patty, always neatly dressed — save and except on washing days, — approached the visitor ; and her gentle looks re-assured Mr. Chauncey Hare Townsend. He wiped his hot brow with his scented handkerchief, and, not without emotion, introduced himself to the owner of the house and the neat little wife. The conversation which followed was short, and somewhat unsatisfactory on both sides, and the London poet, in the course of a short half an hour, quitted the Helpston minstrel, leaving a sonnet, wrapped- in a one-pound note, behind him. Clare frowned when discovering the nature of the envelope ; but he liked the sonnet, and for the sake of it, and on Patty's petition, consented not to send it back to the giver. [1]
[edit] Friendship with Charles Dickens
In the 1830s Townshend studied mesmerism, and was the chief British exponent of the art after Dr. John Elliotson; he published two books and some articles and letters on the subject. Elliotson introduced Townshend to Charles Dickens, who also had an interest in mesmerism, and the two became lifelong friends. Townshend's volume of poetry The Three Gates (1859) was dedicated to Dickens, who in turn dedicated Great Expectations to Townshend; Dickens also gave Townshend the original manuscript of the novel, and his crystal ball.
[edit] Bibliography
The life and times of Chauncy Hare Townshend, a Victorian collector, ed. Dr. Peter Cave, The friends of Wisbech and Fenland Museum, 1998, ISBN 0 9519613 2 2
