of Troy,’ and in 1816 his ‘Illustrations of the Retreat of the Ten Thousand;’ while after his death his daughter published two volumes, entitled ‘A Treatise on the Comparative Geography of Western Asia’ (London, 1831, with atlas), which may be looked upon as the great geographer's workshop, displaying his critical methods and his treatment of the materials he collected.
Rennell gave much of his attention to the geography of Africa, and, among other results of his researches, he has the merit of having first established the true view of the voyage of Hanno and its southern limit. In 1790 he constructed a new map of the northern half of Africa for the African Association, accompanied by a very able memoir on the materials for compiling such a map. On the return of Mungo Park in 1797 all his materials were placed in the hands of Rennell, who worked out the ardent young traveller's routes with great care. Rennell's geographical illustrations were published with a map of Park's route, which was afterwards used to illustrate Park's book.
Rennell was before all things a sailor. He never forgot that he had been a surveying midshipman. He showed this in the enormous amount of labour and trouble he devoted to the study of winds and currents, collecting a great mass of materials from the logs of his numerous friends and correspondents, and prosecuting his inquiries with untiring zeal. About 1810 he began to reduce his collections to one general system. His current charts of the Atlantic and his memoirs were completed by him, although they were not published in his lifetime. He was the first to explain the causes of the occasional northerly set to the southward of the Scilly Islands, which has since been known as ‘Rennell's Current.’ He did this in two papers read before the Royal Society on 6 June 1793 and 13 April 1815. His current charts and memoirs were invaluable at the time, and he was offered the post of first hydrographer to the admiralty, but he declined it because the work would interfere with his literary pursuits. Among minor publications Rennell wrote papers in the ‘Archæologia’ on the ruins of Babylon, the identity of Jerash, the shipwreck of St. Paul, and the landing of Cæsar.
After the death of Sir Joseph Banks, Rennell was for the next ten years the acknowledged head of British geographers. Travellers and explorers came to him with their rough work, projects were submitted for his opinion, and reports were sent to him from all parts of the world. In 1801 he had become an associate of the Institute of France, and in 1825 he received the gold medal of the Royal Society of Literature. He died on 29 March 1830. He was interred in the nave of Westminster Abbey, and there is a tablet to his memory, with a bust, near the western door. The year of his death saw the foundation of the Royal Geographical Society.
Rennell married, at Calcutta, in 1772, Jane, daughter of Dr. Thomas Thackeray, headmaster of Harrow, and great-aunt of the novelist, William Makepeace Thackeray. His wife died in 1810. His second son, William, was in the Bengal civil service, and died in 1819, leaving no children; the eldest, Thomas, was unmarried, and survived until 1846. His talented daughter Jane was married, in 1809, to Admiral Sir John Tremayne Rodd, K.C.B. Lady Rodd devoted several years to the pious labour of publishing her father's current charts and revising new editions of his principal works. She died in December 1863.
Rennell was of middle height, well proportioned, with a grave yet sweet expression of countenance. The miniature painted for Lord Spencer represents him sitting in his chair, with folded arms, as in reflection. He was diffident and unassuming, but ever ready to impart information. His conversation was interesting, and he had a remarkable flow of spirits. In all his discussions he was candid and ingenuous.
[Sir Henry Yule's Memoir in the Royal Engineers' Journal, 1881; Mrs. Bayne's Thackeray Family History, privately printed; Markham's Life of Rennell in the Century Science Series, 1895; Rennell's Works.]
RENNELL, THOMAS (1787–1824), divine, only son of Thomas Rennell (1754–1840) [q. v.], dean of Winchester, was born at Winchester in 1787. Like his father, he was educated at Eton, where he had a brilliant reputation as a scholar. He won one of Dr. Claudius Buchanan's prizes for a Greek Sapphic ode on the propagation of the gospel in India, and a prize for Latin verses on ‘Pallentes Morbi.’ He also conducted, in conjunction with three of his contemporaries, a periodical called the ‘Miniature,’ a successor of the ‘Microcosm.’ In 1806 he was elected from Eton to King's College, Cambridge. There in 1806 he won Sir William Browne's medal for the best Greek ode on the subject ‘Veris Comites;’ in 1810 he published, in conjunction with C. J. Blomfield, afterwards bishop of London, ‘Musæ Cantabrigienses,’ and he contributed to the ‘Museum Criticum,’ a journal established in 1813 by Blomfield and
