Bibliography.—The best edition of Ford is that by William Gifford, with notes and introduction, revised with additions to both text and notes by Alexander Dyce (1869). An edition of the Dramatic Works of Massinger and Ford appeared in 1840, with an introduction by Hartley Coleridge. The Best Plays of Ford were edited for the “Mermaid Series” in 1888, with an introduction by W. H. Havelock Ellis, and reissued in 1903. A. C. Swinburne’s “Essay on Ford” is reprinted among his Essays and Studies (1875). Perkin Warbeck and ’Tis Pity were translated into German by F. Bodenstedt in 1860; and the latter again by F. Blei in 1904. The probable sources of the various plays are discussed in Emil Koeppel’s Quellenstudien zu den Dramen George Chapman’s, Philip Massinger’s und John Ford’s (1897). (A. W. W.)
FORD, RICHARD (1796–1858), English author of one of the earliest and best of travellers’ Handbooks, was the eldest son of Sir Richard Ford, who in 1789 was member of parliament for East Grinstead, and for many years afterwards chief police magistrate of London. His mother was the daughter and heiress of Benjamin Booth, a distinguished connoisseur in art. He was called to the bar, but never practised, and in 1830–1833 he travelled in Spain, spending much of his time in the Alhambra and at Seville. His first literary work (other than contributions to the Quarterly Review) was a pamphlet, An Historical Inquiry into the Unchangeable Character of a War in Spain (Murray, 1837), in reply to one called the Policy of England towards Spain, issued under the patronage of Lord Palmerston. He spent the winter of 1839–1840 in Italy, where he added largely to his collection of majolica; and soon after his return he began, at John Murray’s invitation, to write his Handbook for Travellers in Spain, with which his name is chiefly associated. He died on the 1st of September 1858, leaving a fine private collection of pictures to his widow (d. 1910), his third wife, a daughter of Sir A. Molesworth.
FORD, THOMAS (b. c. 1580), English musician, of whose life little more is known than that he was attached to the court of Prince Henry, son of James I. His works also are few, but they are sufficient to show the high stage of efficiency and musical knowledge which the English school had attained at the beginning of the 17th century. They consist of canons and other concerted pieces of vocal music, mostly with lute accompaniment. The chief collection of his works is entitled Musike of Sundrie Kinds set forth in Two Books, &c. (1607), and the histories of music by Burney and Hawkins give specimens of his art. Together with Dowland, immortalized in one of Shakespeare’s sonnets, Ford is the chief representative of the school which preceded Henry Lawes.
FORDE, FRANCIS (d. 1770), British soldier, first appears in the army list as a captain in the 39th Foot in 1746. This regiment was the first of the king’s service to serve in India (hence its motto Primus in Indis), and Forde was on duty there when in 1755 he became major, at the same time as Eyre Coote, soon to become his rival, was promoted captain. At the express invitation of Clive, Forde resigned his king’s commission to take the post of second in command of the E.I. Company’s troops in Bengal. Soon after Plassey, Forde was sent against the French of Masulipatam. Though feebly supported by the motley rabble of an army which Anandraz, the local ally, brought into the field, Forde pushed ahead through difficult country and came upon the enemy entrenched at Condore. For four days the two armies faced one another; on the fifth both commanders resolved on the offensive and an encounter ensued. In spite of the want of spirit shown by Anandraz and his men, Forde in the end succeeded in winning the battle, which was from first to last a brilliant piece of work. Nor did he content himself with this; on the same evening he stormed the French camp, and his pursuit was checked only by the guns of Masulipatam itself. The place was quickly invested on the land side, but difficulties crowded upon Forde and his handful of men. For fifty days little advance was made; then Forde, seeing the last avenues of escape closing behind him, ordered an assault at midnight on the 25th of January 1759. The Company’s troops lost one-third of their number, but the storm was a brilliant and astounding success. Forde received less than no reward. The Company refused to confirm his lieut.-colonel’s commission, and he found himself junior to Eyre Coote, his old subaltern in the 39th Foot. Nevertheless he continued to assist Clive, and on the 25th of November 1759 won a success comparable to Condore at Chinsurah (or Biderra) against the Dutch. A year later he at last received his commission, but was still opposed by a faction of the directors which supported Coote. Clive himself warmly supported Forde in these quarrels. In 1769, with Vansittart and Scrafton, Colonel Forde was sent out with full powers to investigate every detail of Indian administration. Their ship was never heard of after leaving the Cape of Good Hope on the 27th of December.
Monographs on Condore, Masulipatam and Chinsurah will be found in Malleson’s Decisive Battles of India.
FORDHAM, formerly a village of Westchester county, New York, U.S.A., and now a part of New York City. It lies on the mainland, along the eastern bank of the Harlem river, E. of the northern end of Manhattan Island. It is the seat of Fordham University (Roman Catholic), founded in 1841 as St John’s College, and since 1846 conducted by the Society of Jesus. In 1907 the institution was rechartered as Fordham University, and now includes St John’s College high school and grammar school, St John’s College, the Fordham University medical school (all in Fordham), and the Fordham University law school (42 Broadway, New York City). In 1907–1908 the university had 96 instructors and (exclusive of 364 students in the high school) 236 students, of whom 105 were in St John’s College, 31 in the medical school, and 100 in the law school. In Fordham still stands the house in which Edgar Allan Poe lived from 1844 to 1849 and in which he wrote “Annabel Lee,” “Ulalume,” &c.
The hamlet of Fordham was established in 1669 by Jan Arcer (a Dutchman, who called himself “John Archer” after coming to America), who in that year received permission from Francis Lovelace, colonial governor of New York, to settle sixteen families on the mainland close by a fording-place of the Spuyten Duyvil Creek, near where that stream enters the Harlem river. Between 1655 and 1671 Archer bought from the Indians the tract of land lying between Spuyten Duyvil Creek and the Harlem river on the east and the Bronx river on the west, and extending from the hamlet of Fordham to what is now High Bridge. In 1671 Governor Lovelace erected this tract into the manor of Fordham. In 1846 it was included with Morrisania in the township of West Farms; and in 1872 with part of the township of Yonkers was erected into the township of Kingsbridge, which in 1874 was annexed to the city of New York, and in 1898 became a part of the borough of the Bronx, New York City.
FORDUN, JOHN OF (d. c. 1384), Scottish chronicler. The statement generally made that the chronicler was born at Fordoun (Kincardineshire) has not been supported by any direct evidence. It is certain that he was a secular priest, and that he composed his history in the latter part of the 14th century; and it is probable that he was a chaplain in the cathedral of Aberdeen. The work of Fordun is the earliest attempt to write a continuous history of Scotland. We are informed that Fordun’s patriotic zeal was roused by the removal or destruction of many national records by Edward III. and that he travelled in England and Ireland, collecting material for his history. This work is divided into five books. The first three are almost entirely fabulous, and form the groundwork on which Boece and Buchanan afterwards based their historical fictions, which were exposed by Thomas Innes in his Critical Essay (i. pp. 201-214). The 4th and 5th books, though still mixed with fable, contain much valuable information, and become more authentic the more nearly they approach the author’s own time. The 5th book concludes with the death of King David I. in 1153. Besides these five books, Fordun wrote part of another book, and collected materials for bringing down the history to a later period. These materials were used by a continuator who wrote in the middle of the 15th century, and who is identified with Walter Bower (q.v.), abbot of the monastery of Inchcolm. The additions of Bower form eleven books, and bring down the narrative to the death of King James I. in 1437. According
