Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 01.djvu/73

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Ackermann
59
Acland

unceasing labour towards organising the distribution of over 200,000l., of which more than one-half was contributed by public subscriptions, the remainder consisting of a special grant from parliament. For this service he received from the king of Saxony the order of Civil Merit, but modestly declined the many expressions of popular gratitude offered by German towns in the course of a subsequent visit to the Continent (see A short Account of the successful Exertions [of R. Ackermann] on behalf of the Fatherless and Widows after the War in 1814, Oxf. priv. pr. 1871, 16mo). In 1815 he collected and distributed a large sum for the succour of wounded Prussian soldiers and their relatives. About the same period the Spanish exiles, like the French émigrés of a quarter of a century before, found in him a generous employer.

He also printed and published many Spanish translations and original works, and formed branch depôts in several South American cities. Ackermann's Wednesday evening ‘Literary Meetings’ during March and April had become from 1813 quite a feature in the literary and artistic world. In 1827 he returned to premises at 86 Strand, designed by J. B. Papworth. He married a second time, and in 1830 experienced an attack of paralysis which prevented him thenceforward from attending to business. He died at Finchley on 30 March 1834, and was buried at St. Clement Danes. His eldest son, Rudolph, carried on a fine-art business in Regent Street, and died in 1868.

A list of his numerous fine-art publications is contained in the two excellent articles by W[yatt] P[apworth] in ‘Notes and Queries’ for 1869. The name of Ackermann is intimately associated with the ‘Repository of Arts, Literature, Fashions, Manufactures, &c.,’ which at once became so successful that before the end of the first year (1809) it obtained 3,000 subscribers. It regularly appeared until 1828, when forty volumes had been produced in monthly 3s. 6d. parts, under the editorship of F. Shoberl. Wm. Combe was a large contributor, and Rowlandson supplied many of the plates. The illustrations of fashions, mostly by well-known artists, supply valuable materials for the history of costume. Many of the contributions to the ‘Repository’ were reissued separately. ‘Dr. Syntax's Tour in search of the Picturesque’ first appeared in Ackermann's ‘Poetical Magazine,’ 1809–11, under the title of the ‘Schoolmaster's Tour.’ Among his chief publications may also be mentioned ‘The Microcosm of London,’ 1808–11, 3 vols. 4to; ‘Westminster Abbey,’ 1812, 2 vols. 4to; ‘University of Oxford,’ 1814, 2 vols. 4to; ‘University of Cambridge,’ 1815, 2 vols. 4to; ‘Colleges of Winchester, Eton, Westminster, &c.,’ 1816, 4to. W. H. Pyne and William Combe supplied the text for these antiquarian works, the plates being drawn by A. Pugin, Rowlandson, Nash, and others. His remarkable series of ‘Picturesque Tours’ in elephant 4to includes ‘The Rhine,’ by J. G. von Gerning, 1820; ‘Buenos Aires and Monte Video,’ by Vidal, 1820; ‘English Lakes,’ by Fielding and Walton, 1821; ‘The Seine,’ by Pugin and Gendall, 1821; ‘The Ganges and Jumna,’ by C. R. Forrest, 1824; ‘India,’ by R. M. Grindlay (atlas folio), 1826; and ‘The Thames,’ by Westall and Owen, 1828. The ‘World in Miniature,’ 43 vols. 12mo, 637 plates, was commenced in 1821 by T. Rowlandson, and finished in 1826 by W. H. Pyne. He introduced from Germany the fashion of the illustrated annual, upon which, between 1822 and 1856, English publishers expended large sums for illustrations and literary contributions. In the first rank of these popular gift-books stood his ‘Forget-me-not,’ first brought out in 1825 in a manner unapproached for typographical and artistic merit. It was continued until 1847 under the editorship of F. Shoberl.

[Notes and Queries, 4th series, iv. 109, 129, 5th series, ix. 346, x. 18; Didaskalia (Frankf. a. Main), No. 103, 13 April 1864; Gent. Mag. 1834, i. 560; Annual Biography, 1835.]

H. R. T.

ACKLAND, THOMAS GILBANK (1791–1844), divine, was educated at the Charterhouse and St. John's College, Cambridge. He became B.A. in 1811, M.A. in 1814, and in 1818 was instituted to the rectory of St. Mildred's, Bread Street, which he held till his death, 20 Feb. 1844. He published by subscription, in 1812, a volume of miscellaneous poems in the style of the preceding century. He is also the author of a few sermons.

Gent. Mag. N.S. xxi. 659.]

ACLAND, Lady CHRISTIAN HENRIETTA CAROLINE, generally called Lady Harriet (1750–1815), was the third surviving daughter of Stephen, first earl of Ilchester, and was born on 3 Jan. 1749-50. In Nov. 1770 she was married, at Redlynch Park, Somersetshire, to John Dyke Acland [see Acland, John Dyke]. When her husband was ordered to attend his regiment to Canada in 1776, he was accompanied by Lady Harriet Acland, and the narrative of her sufferings during the campaign, which has been often printed in both England and America, forms one of the brightest episodes in the war with the American people. He was taken ill in Canada, and