St. Paul's School (11 Sept. 1815), and while there won the English verse prize (1823) and the high master's prize for the best Latin essay (1824). In the latter year he proceeded with a Pauline exhibition to Trinity College, Oxford, and, like another distinguished sympathiser with tractarian doctrines, was first a scholar and then a fellow of that college. Trinity College ranked second to Oriel only in sympathy with the Oxford movement, and Copeland, though never wavering in his attachment to the English church, entered into close connection with all the leading tractarians of the university. While at college he was ill and took no honours; but he was always known as one of the best Latin scholars at Oxford. His degrees were B.A. 1829, M.A. 1831, and B.D. 1840, and he was duly elected to a fellowship. In 1829 he was ordained to the curacy of St. Olave, Jewry; for the next three years he was curate of Hackney; and in 1832 he went to Oxford, where he remained until he accepted, in 1849, the college living of Farnham, Essex. This was his sole preferment in the church, and after a long illness he died at the rectory on 26 Aug. 1885. He never neglected his parochial duties, and he rebuilt the parish church with extreme care of design and execution.
Copeland was gifted with a keen sense of humour and with strong sympathies, which attracted to him a host of friends. He collected materials for, if he did not actually begin to write, a history of the tractarian movement; and as he possessed a tenacious memory, and had been intimately allied with the leaders of the cause, he would have completed the task to perfection. Newman dedicated to Copeland his ‘Sermons on Subjects of the Day’ as the kindest of friends, and Copeland edited eight volumes of Newman's ‘Parochial and Plain Sermons’ (1868), an edition which was more than once reprinted, besides printing a valuable volume of selections from the same series of discourses. The ‘Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Epistle to the Ephesians’ were translated by Copeland, and included in the fifth volume of the ‘Library of the Fathers;’ and Mozley says that Copeland contributed to the ‘Tracts for the Times.’ Part of his library passed, through the agency of his nephew, W. Copeland Borlase, formerly M.P. for St. Austell, Cornwall, to the National Liberal Club.
[Gardiner's St. Paul's School, 253, 403, 424, 427; T. Mozley's Reminiscences, ii. 3; Guardian, 2 Sept. 1885, p. 1294.]
COPELAND, WILLIAM TAYLOR (1797–1868), alderman of London, and porcelain manufacturer, was born 24 March 1797. He was the son of William Copeland, the partner of Josiah Spode, and after the decease of his father and the retirement of the latter he was for a long period at the head of the large pottery establishment known as that of ‘Spode’ at Stoke-on-Trent, and also of the firm in London. In 1828–9 he served the office of sheriff of London and Middlesex, and during the year was elected alderman for the ward of Bishopsgate. He became lord mayor in 1835, and was seven years president of the royal hospitals of Bridewell and Bethlehem (1861–8), and member of the Irish Society, upon which devolves the management of the estates in Ireland belonging to the city of London. In 1831 and 1833 he as a liberal contested unsuccessfully the borough of Coleraine, but was seated on petition in both years, and retained his seat until the general election of 1837. He was then returned as a conservative for Stoke-on-Trent, which seat he held until 1852, when he was defeated, and again from 1857 to 1865. He was a moderate conservative after abandoning the liberal party, and although he did not take an active part in the debates of the House of Commons, he was a useful member of committees, and a watchful guardian of the interests of the important district of the potteries which he represented. He also took an active part in civic affairs, maintaining with chivalrous zeal the ancient rights and privileges of the city of London whenever any of these were objects of attack. Copeland's name will rank along with that of Minton and one or two others as the real regenerators of the industry of the potteries. Though not possessing the knowledge of art which distinguished Wedgwood, he chose as his associates men of unquestionable taste and judgment, among whom was Thomas Battam, with whose aid the productions of his manufactory gained a world-wide renown, and in all the great international exhibitions of recent times obtained the highest commendation both for their design and execution. But the branch of ceramic art which Copeland carried to the highest degree of perfection was the manufacture of parian groups and statuettes, in which he secured the co-operation of some of the most eminent sculptors of the day, including Gibson, Calder Marshall, Foley, Marochetti, and Durham. Copeland was in early life a keen sportsman, keeping a stud of race-horses, and always identifying himself with those who sought to maintain the honour of the sport as an old English institution. He died at Russell Farm, Watford, Hertfordshire, 12 April 1868.
[Times, 14 April 1868, reprinted in Gent. Mag. 1868, i. 691; City Press, 18 April 1868; Art Journal, 1868, p. 158.]
