Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 28.djvu/194

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
Hughes
188
Hughes


Oliver Twist. The Boston Athenæum possesses several specimens of his work. He died at Boston, U.S.A., 5 March 1868.

[Art Journal, 1868; Clement and Hutton's Artists of the Nineteenth Century, 1879; Drake's American Biography.]

F. M. O'D.

HUGHES, THOMAS (fl. 1587), dramatist, a native of Cheshire, was matriculated at Queens' College, Cambridge, in November 1571, proceeded B.A. 1575-6, and on 8 Sept. 1576 was elected a fellow of his college under a royal mandate. On leaving Cambridge he became a member of Gray's Inn. He had the chief share in the authorship of `The Misfortunes of Arthur, reduced into Tragical Notes by T. H.,' a play performed before Queen Elizabeth at Greenwich on 8 Feb. 1587-8, by members of Gray's Inn, and printed with the general title of `Certaine Devises and Shewes presented to her Majestie by the Gentlemen of Grayes-Inne at her Highnesse Court in Greenwich,' &c., Robert Robinson, 1587, b.l., 8vo (Brit. Museum and Duke of Devonshire's Library). This play was reprinted in Collier's supplement to `Dodsley,' and is included in Mr. Hazlitt's edition of Dodsley's collection. It is one of the earliest plays in which blank verse was employed, and Francis Bacon helped to arrange the dumb-shows.

[Cooper's Athenæ Cantabr. ii. 24,543; Baker's Biog. Dram. 1812, iii. 46-7; Dodsley's Old Plays, ed Hazlitt, iv. 251, &c.]

A. H. B.

HUGHES, THOMAS SMART (1786–1847), historian, born at Nuneaton, Warwickshire, on 25 Aug. 1786, was the eldest surviving son of Hugh Hughes, curate of Nuneaton, and rector of Hardwick, Northamptonshire. He received his early education from the Rev. J. S. Cobbold, first at Nuneaton grammar school, and afterwards as a private pupil at Wilby in Suffolk. In 1801 he was sent to Shrewsbury School, then under the head-mastership of Dr. Samuel Butler, and in October 1803 was entered as a pensioner at St. John's College, Cambridge. His university career was distinguished. Besides college prizes he gained the Browne medals for the Latin ode, `Mors Nelsoni,' in 1806, and for the Greek ode, 'In Obitum Gulielmi Pitt,' in 1807. He graduated B.A. in 1809 as fourteenth senior optime, and proceeded M.A. in 1811 and B.D. in 1818. He obtained the members' prize for the Latin essay in 1809 and 1810. The latter essay, a discussion of the merits of Cicero and Clarendon, was printed in vol. xvii. of the `Classical Journal,' 1818. Hughes was appointed in 1809 to an assistant-mastership at Harrow, under Dr. George Butler, but finding the position irksome he returned to Cambridge in 1811. In the same year he was elected to a foundation fellowship at St. John's, and in December 1812 accepted the post of travelling tutor to Robert Townley Parker of Cuerden Hall, Lancashire. During a tour of about two years he visited Spain, Italy, Sicily, Greece, and Albania. The result of his observations he published as 'Travels in Sicily, Greece, and Albania,' 2 vols. 4to, 1820; 2nd edit., partly enlarged and partly abridged, 2 vols. 8vo, 1830. The work is illustrated with plates from the drawings of C. R. Cockerell. In September 1815 he was ordained deacon. He was appointed assistant-tutor at his college, but immediately resigned and accepted a fellowship and tutorship at Trinity Hall, thus materially injuring his prospects. In 1817 he accepted a fellowship at Emmanuel College, was elected junior proctor, and won the Seatonian prize poem on `Belshazzar's Feast.' His verses inspired John Martin's well-known painting on that subject. In 1819 he was appointed by Marsh, bishop of Peterborough, domestic and examining chaplain. He remained at Emmanuel, where he became dean and Greek lecturer. In 1822 he published 'An Address to the People of England in the cause of the Greeks, occasioned by the late inhuman massacres in the Isle of Scio,' and in 1823 `Considerations upon the Greek Revolution, with a Vindication of the author's "Address" … from the attacks of C. B. Sheridan.' At Christmas 1822 he was appointed Christian advocate. On his marriage in April 1823 he became curate at Chesterton, but two years later returned to Cambridge, where he lived until about a year before his death. His occupations were chiefly literary, although he not unfrequently took some clerical duty. He was one of the first examiners for the new classical tripos of 1824, an office which he again filled in 1826 and 1828. On 26 Feb. 1827 he was collated by Bishop Marsh to a prebendal stall at Peterborough (Le Neve, Fasti, ed. Hardy, ii. 551). In the same year he was an unsuccessful candidate for the head-mastership of Rugby School. In 1830 he undertook an edition of the writings of some of the great divines of the English church in a cheap and popular form, with a biographical memoir of each writer, and a summary in the form of an analysis prefixed to each of their works; twenty-two volumes of this collection appeared. In 1832 he was presented by the dean and chapter of Peterborough to the rectory of Fiskerton, Lincolnshire, and in the same year succeeded to the family living of Hardwick. His chief work, the continuation of Hume and Smollett's