Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Gorton, John
GORTON, JOHN (d. 1835), compiler, accomplished a considerable amount of bookwork of a meritorious character, including a translation of Voltaire's ‘Dictionnaire Philosophique,’ 1824; ‘A General Biographical Dictionary’ (2 vols. 1828, with an appendix, 1830 (?), new edition, with a supplement by Cyrus Redding [q. v.], bringing the work as far as 1850, in 4 vols. 1851), which is compiled from rather obvious sources of information; and ‘A Topographical Dictionary of Great Britain and Ireland, the Irish and Welsh Articles by G. N. Wright, with fifty fine maps by S. Hall,’ 3 vols. 1831–3, a work of some accuracy and value; this was first published in separate parts. Gorton was also the author of a poem in indifferent blank verse, ‘Tubal to Seba, the Negro Suicide,’ 1797, and a pamphlet entitled ‘A Solution of that great Scriptural Difficulty the Genealogy of Jesus … with a treatise on the Fall of Adam.’ Gorton died early in 1835.
[Gent. Mag. 1835, i. 666 (where the christian name is wrongly given as William); Brit. Mus. Cat.]