A Dictionary of the Booksellers and Printers who Were at Work in England, Scotland and Ireland from 1641 to 1667/Dugard (William)
DUGARD (WILLIAM), schoolmaster and printer in London; Merchant Taylors School; 1644-62. Born at the Hodges on the Lickhaynde in Shipley Yield, in the parish of Bromsgrove, in the County of Worcester, on January 9th, 1605; King's scholar at Worcester School, graduated M.A. at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, was successively usher of Oundle School in Northamptonshire, Master of the Free School in Stamford, co. Lincoln, Master of the Free School in Colchester, co. Essex, and in 1644 was appointed Master of the Merchant Taylors School in London. About this time he became a member of the Stationers' Company and set up a private printing press at the school. William Dugard's name first appears in the Registers of the Company on September 11th, 1648, when he entered a school book entitled Rhetorice Elementa. In 1649 he printed the first edition of the Eikon Basilike, and followed it with Salmasius' Defensio Regia. This roused the ire of the Council of State, which immediately ordered his arrest, seized his presses and implements, and wrote to the governors of the school directing them to dismiss him. The governors, however, contented themselves with desiring him to relinquish his press work. Sir James Harrington, author of Oceana, and John Milton interceded with the Council on his behalf, and persuaded him at the same time to give up the Royal cause. Upon this his presses were restored to him and he was appointed Printer to "His Highnes the Lord Protector." In addition to his official work, and also the writing, editing and printing of many school books, he printed John Milton's answer to Salmasius; an edition of Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia and miscellaneous works, in 1655; a three volume quarto edition of Luther's Table Talk, and Selden's Mare Clausum, 1652. But he was again in trouble in 1651-2 for printing the Catechesis Ecclesiarum. This book and some others the Council of State ordered to be burnt. In 1661 W. Dugard was dismissed from his post at Merchant Taylors' School and set up a private school in White's Alley in Coleman Street. He died December 3rd, 1662. By his will he left £10 worth of his own books to Syon College and the rest of his property to his daughter Lydia. [P.C.C. 153, Laud.] From the numerous transfers noted in the Registers after his death, it is evident that William Dugard had an interest in a large number of copyrights. His work as a printer will bear favourable comparison with the best of the period. His press was furnished with a good assortment of type, but how far he was his own compositor and pressman, and whether all the books bearing his name were really printed by him, are questions difficult to answer. [D.N.B.]