Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 62.djvu/160

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Winch Winchcombe

154

Feb, 1624-5. He was buried in the cloisters of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, and a monument was erected to his memory at Everton in Bedfordshire, where hia family resided for several generations. By his wife Cicely, daughter of Richard Onslow (1528-1571) [q. v.], he left a son Onslow and a daughter Dorothy, married to George Scott of Hawkhurst in Kent. His male line terminated about 1703 on the death of Sir Humphrey Winch, created a baronet in 1660.

Two legal compilations by Winch were published after his death. The first, which appeared in 1657, was 'The Reports of Sir Humphrey Winch, sometimes one of the Judges of the Court of Common Pleas, containing many choice cases …in the foure last years of King James, faithfully translated out of an exact french Copie,' London, 4to. The original manuscript is in the Cambridge University Library (Cat. Cambr. MSS. iii. 491). The second and more voluminous treatise appeared in 1680. entitled 'Le Beau-Pledeur. A Book of Entries, containing Declarations, Informations, and other Select and Approved Pleadings,' London, 4to.

[Foss's Judges of England, 1857, vi. 201-2; Harl. Soc. Publ. xix. 109; Smyth's Law Officers of Ireland, 1839, pp. 88, 140; Bedfordshire Notes and Quaries, i. 95, 216, 243, 265, iii. 266-7; Bacon's Works, ed. Spedding, Ellis, and Heath, xiii. 85, xiv. 187, Blayde's Geneol. Bedford, 1890. pp. 306, 356, 360, 420, 439; Hist. MSS. Comm. (Rep. on Buccleuch MSS. i. 250); O'Byrne's Representative History. 1844, p. 74; Harl. MS. 6121. f. 65.]

E. I. C.

WINCH, NATHANIEL JOHN (1769?-1838), botanist, was born about 1769. He was throughout his life devoted to the study of plants, especially those of Northumberland, Cumberland, and Durham, and was one of the earliest writers to take 'philosophical views of geographical distribution. He studied cryptogams, especially mosses, as well as flowering plants, and accumulated an herbarium of some twelve thousand species. He was elected a fellow of the Linnean Society in 1803 and an associate in 1821. For more than twenty years he acted as secretary to the Newcastle Infirmary. He died at his residence, Ridley Place, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, on 5 May 1838, aged 69. His manuscripts, library, and herbarium were bequeathed to the Linnean Society, but the greater part of them was subsequently handed over to the Natural History Society of Northumberland and Durham. His name was commemorated by De Candolle in the genus Winchia. Winch's principal publications were:

1. 'The Botanist's Guide through … Northumberland and Durham,' 1805-7, 2 vols. 8vo, written in conjunction with John Thornhill and Richard Waugh, arranged according to the Linnean system and including cryptogams.
2. 'Observations on the Geology of Northumberland and Durham,' 1814, 4to.
3. 'Essay on the Geographical Distribution of Plants through … Northumberland, Cumberland, and Durham,' 1819, 8vo; 2nd ed. 1825.
4. 'Remarks on the Flora of Cumberland,' 1825, 8vo, contributed to the 'Newcastle Magazine' during the preceding year, and reprinted as 'Contributions to the Flora of Cumberland,' 1833, 4to.
5. 'Flora of Northumberland and Durham,' 1831, 4to; reprinted from the 'Transactions' of the Natural History Society of Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle, to which addenda were issued in 1836.

[Britten and Boulger's Biographical Index of Botanists, and authorities there cited.]

G. S. B.

WINCHCOMBE, alias Smalwoode, JOHN (d. 1520), clothier, popularly known as Jack Of Newbury, describes himself in his will as 'John Smalewoode the elder, alias John Wynchcombe, of the parishe of Seynt Nicholas in Newberry.' He is said by Herbert to have been descended from a Simon de Winchcombe, a rich draper of Candlewyk Street, London, who was sheriff of London in 1379 (Livery Companies, i. 394, 401; Mon. Franciscana, ii. 157). He was, however, associated with Newbury from his earliest years, was there apprenticed to a clothier, and subsequently acquired great wealth through his successful pursuit of that trade. The chapbook stories of his having led 100 or 250 men, equipped at his own expense, to the battle of Flodden Field; of his having entertained Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon and refused a knighthood; of the doings of William Sommers [q.v.] and other courtiers at Winchcombe's house, are unsupported by contemporary evidence, and are probably as apocryphal as the legends which gathered round Richard Whittington [q. v.] There is, however, no doubt that Winchcombe was a pioneer of the clothing manufacture, and possibly he was, as Fuller states, the 'most considerable clothier England ever beheld.' He is said to have kept five hundred men at work, and 'Winchcombe's kerseys' were long considered the finest of their kind (Burnley, Hist. of Wool and Wool-combing, p. 69). He is said in an epitaph in Newbury parish church, for the 'edification' of which he left a large bequest, to have died on 15 Feb.