Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 28.djvu/54

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Howard
48
Howard

face after his death, by the order of Prince Potemkin, they seem to have been unfortunately lost. Three short contributions by Howard to the Royal Society will be found in 'Philosophical Transactions' (liv. 118, lvii. 201-2, lxi. 53-4). A fourth edition of his 'State of Prisons,' &c., was published after his death (London, 1792, 4to). Among the family documents of the Whitbread family are several papers of interest relating to Howard. A few of Howard's letters and the correspondence and papers relating to his monument are preserved in the British Museum (Addit. MSS. 5409, 5418, 26055, 28104 f. 53).

[Anecdotes of the Life and Character of John Howard, written by a Gentleman, &c., 1790 (with portrait); Aikin's View of the Character and Public Services of the late John Howard, 1792 (with portrait); James Baldwin Brown's Memoirs of the Public and Private Life of John Howard, 2nd edit. 1823 (with portraits of Howard and his second wife); Thomas Taylor's Memoirs of Howard, 2nd edit. 1836; Hepworth Dixon's John Howard, 2nd edit. 1850; Field's Life of John Howard (with portrait); Field's Correspondence of John Howard; Guy's John Howard's Winter's Journey; Stoughton's Howard the Philanthropist and his Friends; Journal of the Statistical Society, xxxvi. 1-18, xxxviii. 430-7; Lecky's History of England, vi. 255-61; Gent. Mag. 1742 p. 499, 1758 p. 243, 1790 pt. i. pp. 82, 276-9, 287-90, 369, 416-18, 491-2, pt. ii. pp. 685 (with portrait), 713-14, 717, 795., 1050, 1090, 1791 pt. ii. pp. 595, 893,906, 1793 pt. i. p. 513; Universal Mag. lxxxvi. 50, 152, 164, 169-74 (with portrait), 255-64, 318-19; Notes and Queries, 1st ser. iii. 142, xi. 408, 472, 4th ser. viii. 527, ix. 94, 7th ser. viii. 203, 240; Brit. Mus. Cat.]

G. F. R. B.

HOWARD, JOHN (1753–1799), mathematician, born in Fort George garrison, near Inverness, in 1753, was son of Ralph Howard, a private soldier, and was brought up by relations in Carlisle. Apprenticed in his fourteenth year to his uncle, a cork-cutter, who treated him harshly, he ran away to sea; he afterwards worked as a carpenter, and then as a flax-dresser. Having acquired a taste for reading and the elements of mathematics, he opened a school near Carlisle, and, improving himself by study, attracted the attention of Bishop Law, who appointed him master of the Carlisle grammar school, and encouraged him to read for holy orders. Abandoning that scheme, Howard became steward to the bishop's son John [q. v.], when appointed bishop of Clonfert in 1782. In 1786 Howard returned to Carlisle, and resumed school-teaching there until 1794, when he removed to Newcastle-on-Tyne. There he rented the school-house built by Dr. Charles Hutton [q.v.] in Westgate Street, and gained a fair position as instructor and many friends. He had some local reputation as a versifier. Soon after the appearance of his long-projected work on spherical geometry, his health rapidly declined. He died on 26 March 1799, aged 46, at the Leazes, near Newcastle, and was buried in St. John's churchyard.

When in Carlisle, Howard wrote much for the 'Ladies and Gentlemen's Diaries.' His reputation as a mathematician rests mainly on the 'Treatise on Spherical Geometry,' which he published in Newcastle-on-Tyne in 1798. It deals with the maxima and minima of certain lines and areas, and sets a variety of problems. When discussing some loci of spherical angles and triangles, and certain lines drawn on spherical and cylindrical surfaces, the author notes many analogies between the properties of lines meeting on the surface of the sphere and those drawn to meet a plane circle. The epitaph on Howard's tombstone records 'many other ingenious mathematical and poetical pieces.'

[Richardson's Table Book, ii. 410; Mackenzie's Account of Newcastle-on-Tyne, ii. 350, 465.]

R. E. A.

HOWARD, JOHN ELIOT (1807–1883), quinologist, son of Luke Howard [q. v.], the meteorologist, was born at Plaistow, Essex, 11 Dec. 1807. Throughout his life he was connected with his father's chemical manufactory at Stratford. His first paper, a report on the collection of cinchona in the British Museum made by the Spanish botanist Pavon, was published in 1852. In the following year he joined the Pharmaceutical Society, and in 1857 the Linnean Society. Being specially interested in quinine he purchased at Madrid, in 1858, the manuscript 'Nueva Quinologia' and the specimens of cinchona belonging to Pavon; employed a botanical artist to illustrate them, and published in 1862 the sumptuous 'Illustrations of the "Nueva Quinologia" of Pavon, and Observations on the Barks described.' Howard's second great work, 'The Quinology of the East Indian Plantations,' published in 1869, was the result of his examination of the bark of all the forms of cinchona introduced into India from the Andes by Markham, Spruce, and Cross. For this he received the thanks of her majesty's government, and in 1874 was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. Howard took considerable interest in gardening, and especially in hybridisation as bearing upon cultivated cinchonas, and was the author of numerous scientific papers, chiefly on quinology. He also gave addresses on both science and revelation at the Victoria Institute, of which he was a vice-president.