Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 48.djvu/87

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and a brother a prisoner for debt in the king's bench. His brother escaped, and William was imprisoned in Ludgate on suspicion of complicity. By the end of summer 1646, on the recapture of his brother in Wales, he was released, and in December of the same year he went to aid his old friend, John Whitlock, in his cure at Leighton.

Reynolds proceeded M.A. at Cambridge in 1648, and on 10 Oct. 1649 was, along with Whitlock, incorporated at Oxford. Both refused the ‘engagement,’ and in March 1650–1651 they left Leighton to become ministers of St. Mary's, Nottingham. They were ordained in October 1651 by the ministers of the eighth London classis in St. Andrew Undershaft, London, and, adopting presbyterian discipline at Nottingham, chose elders and deacons. In 1653 they built a parsonage-house. In 1656 the Nottingham ministers formed a classis of their own. Reynolds signed the original undated draft of the association (MS. Nottingham Minutes), and almost uninterruptedly till 1660 attended the meetings, some of which were held in his house, he acting as moderator. The two friends continued their joint ministrations, despite some obstruction, till within two months of Bartholomew day (Conformists' Fourth Plea for the Nonconformists, pp. 36, 37, 43, 44, 77). In October 1662 they removed to Colwich Hall, a house belonging to Sir John Mason. In 1665 they were imprisoned for twelve weeks at the Black Moor's Head Inn (Nottingham), and afterwards, living in the neighbourhood, preached where they could in the town. At midsummer 1668 they removed to Mansfield, thenceforth preaching every fortnight at Nottingham. In March 1684–5 they were both committed to Nottingham county gaol, till July 1685, ‘for coming to a borough town,’ but on Monmouth's landing in June they were sent prisoners to Hull. They were released in August. On 14 Oct. 1687, after nineteen years' sojourn at Mansfield, they returned to Nottingham, where they continued their joint ministry till Reynolds's death. Reynolds died at Nottingham on 26 Feb. 1697–8.

On 10 May 1652 Reynolds married Susanna, daughter of Alderman Mellor. She died in April 1671, leaving two sons and two daughters. The younger daughter was married in 1684 to Samuel Coates, minister at Mansfield, Nottinghamshire.

He published, in 1658, a funeral sermon on ‘Francis Pierepont,’ third son of Robert Pierrepont, first earl of Kingston [q. v.]

[Transcripts, in the writer's possession, of the manuscript minutes of the Nottingham classical assembly, preserved in the High Pavement chapel, Nottingham, and of the fourth London classis; Whitlock's Short Account of the Life of Reynolds, 1698; Barrett's Sermon preached at the Funeral of Mr. Reynolds, 1 March 1697–8; Heywood's Diaries; Foster's Alumni Oxon.; Cartwright's Nonconf. in Nottingham; Calamy's Account and Nonconformists' Memorial, iii. 101; Historical Manuscripts Commission, 7th Rep. p. 132.]

W. A. S.


REYNOLDS-MORETON, HENRY JOHN, second Earl of Ducie (1802–1853). [See Moreton.]


RHAM, WILLIAM LEWIS (1778–1843), agriculturist, was born in Utrecht in 1778, his father being Dutch and his mother Swiss. When still young he came to England and afterwards attended Edinburgh University as a medical student, but, determining to seek holy orders, entered Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated B.A. in 1806 (M.A. 1810), and was tenth wrangler. After taking holy orders he successively held the rectory of Fersfield, Norfolk, from 1803; the vicarage of Broad Hinton, Wiltshire, from 1804; a prebend of Bitton in Salisbury, from 1806; and the vicarage of Winkfield, Berkshire, from 1808. He remained at Winkfield till his death.

Rham was very popular with his rural parishioners, devoting himself to agricultural pursuits, upon which he became one of the greatest authorities of his day (cf. Donaldson, Agric. Biogr. p. 125). He was a member of the Royal Agricultural Society, and sat on its council and committees from its beginning in 1838.

To its journal Rham contributed several valuable papers on practical agriculture, including an ‘Essay on the Simplest and Easiest Mode of Analysing Soils’ (i. 46), which won a prize offered by the society. He maintained his connection with the continent by frequent visits, and his knowledge of continental methods is one of the features of his agricultural papers. As the result of one of these continental trips, when he walked from farm to farm and accepted the rough hospitality of the peasantry, he contributed to the agricultural section of the ‘Library of Useful Knowledge’ a manual on ‘Flemish Industry.’ He also contributed to publications like the ‘Gardeners' Chronicle’ and the ‘Penny Cyclopædia.’ A compilation of the articles which he wrote for the latter was published as ‘A Dictionary of the Farm,’ London, 1844, and went through five editions; the later ones being edited and supplemented by other hands. He also edited and revised an edition of Doyle's ‘Cyclopædia of Practical Husbandry,’ London, 1851.

His continental experience taught him the necessity of agricultural schools, and the school of industry which he opened at Wink-