1764, graduated B.A. 10 Oct. 1767, M.A. 27 June 1770, and went out grand compounder for the degrees in divinity 7 Nov. 1782 (Foster, Alumni Oxon. 1715–1886, col. 543; Oxford Graduates, 1851, p. 267). His delicacy prevented him from taking much clerical work, but he was often sought as a preacher of charity sermons. As a boy he developed an intense love for collecting books, especially early classics, grammars, and theological works. At the London auction rooms his deformity subjected him to the coarse gibes of his opponent, Michael Lort, and he was ridiculed for his impatience at too frequent a repetition of threepenny biddings at Paterson's (J. T. Smith, Book for a Rainy Day, p. 94). He became much attached to Richard Heber, whom he regarded as his pupil in book-hunting. He helped Dibdin in preparing the second edition of his ‘Introduction to the Classics’ (Dibdin, Reminiscences, pt. i. p. 205). A severe illness which kept him from the sale of the Pinelli collection in 1789 was cured by permission to inspect one of the volumes of the first Complutensian Polyglot Bible of Cardinal Ximenes, printed on vellum, and clad in the original binding (ib. pt. i. 206 n.) Gosset died suddenly in Newman Street, London, 12 Dec. 1812, in the sixty-eighth year of his age, and was buried in Old Marylebone cemetery (Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. vii. 364–5). By his marriage on 9 Jan. 1782 to Miss C. Hill of Newman Street (Gent. Mag. lii. 45) he had two sons and a daughter. His elder son, Isaac Gosset (1782–1855), was chaplain to the royal household at Windsor under four sovereigns (ib. lii. 598, new ser. xliii. 435–6). His younger son, Thomas Stephen Gosset (1791–1847), a senior fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge (B.A. 1812, M.A. 1815, ninth wrangler and senior chancellor's medallist), became vicar of Old Windsor in 1824 (ib. new ser. xxviii. 549). Gosset left in manuscript an unfinished work on New Testament criticism. At the solicitation of Dr. Edwards he contributed some notes to John Nichols's edition of William Bowyer's ‘Critical Conjectures and Observations on the New Testament, collected from various Authors,’ 4to, London, 1782. He is described under the character of Lepidus in Dibdin's ‘Bibliomania’ (ed. 1842, pp. 121–122, 363, 407), and laughingly approved the description when read to him by its author. Stephen Weston lamented the loss to bibliography in ‘The Tears of the Booksellers,’ which appeared the year after his death in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine,’ vol. lxxxiii. pt. i. p. 160. His library, which was rather select than extensive, was sold by Leigh & Sotheby during three weeks of June 1813. For some of the prices which the volumes brought reference may be made to Horne's ‘Introduction to Bibliography,’ ii. 651, and the ‘Classical Journal,’ viii. 471. Gosset was elected F.R.S. on 18 June 1772 (Thomson, Hist. of Roy. Soc. App. iv. p. liv). His portrait has been engraved.
[Gent. Mag. lxix. ii. 1088–9, lxxxii. ii. 596, 601, 669–70; Notes and Queries, 1st ser. xi. 66; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. iii. 114, 497, viii. 150; Clarke's Repertorium Bibliographicum, p. 455; Dibdin's Decameron, iii. 5–8, 78; Foster's Our Noble and Gentle Families, vol. ii; Evans's Cat. of Engraved Portraits, i. 143.]
GOSSET, MONTAGUE (1792–1854), surgeon, born on 1 July 1792, was the second son of Daniel Gosset of Langhedge Hall, Tanner's End, Edmonton. He was educated at a school at Broxbourne, Hertfordshire, conducted by a clergyman named Jones. Although he wished to adopt a learned profession, his father determined that he should join the navy. He was accordingly entered in November 1806 on board H.M.S. Curlew, commanded by Captain Thomas Young. He remained with Young until July 1807, when he was transferred to the Guerrier, and subsequently to the Snake sloop of war, in which he narrowly escaped shipwreck. After serving nearly three years he was invalided from the West Indies with a broken leg and shattered health. On his recovery he resolved to quit the navy and study surgery. He was apprenticed to Mr. Stocker of Guy's Hospital in 1809, and obtained his diploma in May 1814. He passed through the hospital with considerable distinction, being a favoured pupil of Sir Astley Cooper. By Cooper he was recommended to the Marquis of Bute, who was then suffering from an eye complaint. In 1815 he went to Scotland for two years, after which he returned to Guy's Hospital, and again devoted himself to study until 1819, when he commenced practice as a consulting surgeon in Great George Street, Westminster. Thence he removed to the city, where he practised for thirty-four years, first in George Street and lastly in Broad Street Buildings. Gosset was among the first to detect and describe in February 1827 a peculiar accident to the elbow-joint, namely dislocation of the ulna backwards and inwards. The case is mentioned in Sir Astley Cooper's ‘Treatise on Dislocations,’ ed. B. B. Cooper, 1842, pp. 451–2. In 1829 Gosset communicated the only case of renal aneurism then detected, the preparation of which is deposited in the museum of Guy's Hospital. In 1834 he directed attention to the use of the gilt-wire suture, which he employed in a
