against the Arabs in 1858. He commanded the royal engineers throughout the Abyssinian campaign of 1868, was mentioned in despatches by Lord Napier of Magdala for his ‘invaluable and important services during the expedition,’ was appointed aide-de-camp to the queen, with the rank of colonel in the army, and received the medal.
An accomplished draughtsman and artist, Wilkins was employed in architectural and engineering works in the public works department of India, and his designs were remarkable for their fitness and beauty. Among them may be noted: at Aden, the restoration of the ancient tanks in the Tawella Valley, dating from about 600 A.D.; at Bombay, the government and the public works secretariats (he also won the first prize in a competition by his design for the European general hospital); at Puna, the Sassoon hospital, the Deccan college, the Jewish synagogue, and the mausoleum of the Sassoon family; at Bhuj, the palace of the rao of Kach; at Bhejapur, the restoration and adaptation of ancient buildings to the requirements of a new station.
Wilkins published ‘Reconnoitring in Abyssinia,’ 1868, and ‘A Treatise on Mountain Roads, Live Loads, and Bridges,’ 1879. He was engaged in the revision of the latter work when he died suddenly, on 15 Dec. 1896, at his residence at Queen's Gate, South Kensington. Wilkins married, in 1856, Violet, daughter of Colonel Colin Campbell McIntyre, C.B., of the 78th highlanders.
[Royal Engineers Records and Professional Papers, vol. xvii. (1869); Despatches; Times, December 1896; Memoir by General John Fuller, R.E., in Royal Engineers' Journal, 1897.]
WILKINS, JOHN (1614–1672), bishop of Chester, was the son of Walter Wilkins, an Oxford goldsmith, ‘a very ingeniose man with a very mechanicall head. He was much for trying of experiments, and his head ran much upon the perpetuall motion.’ He married a daughter of John Dod [q. v.] ‘the decalogist,’ at whose house at Fawsley in Northamptonshire John Wilkins was born in 1614. Walter Wilkins appears to have died when his son was young, and his widow, by a second marriage, became the mother of Walter Pope [q. v.]
John Wilkins's early education was directed by his grandfather; he was then sent to a private school in Oxford kept by Edward Sylvester, ‘the common drudge of the university,’ whence, at the early age of thirteen, he was entered at New Inn Hall on 4 May 1627. Migrating to Magdalen Hall, where his tutor was John Tombes [q. v.], he graduated B.A. in 1631 and M.A. in 1634. After acting as a tutor at Oxford for a few years he took orders, and became in 1637 vicar of his native parish of Fawsley; but, on realising that he could promote his interests better by attaching himself to persons of influence, he resigned his benefice, and became successively private chaplain to William Fiennes, first viscount Saye and Sele; George, eighth lord Berkeley; and to the prince palatine, Charles Lewis, nephew of Charles I, and elder brother of Prince Rupert, who, deprived of his hereditary dominions, was residing in England in the hope of obtaining help to recover them. Wilkins is said to have been made his chaplain on account of his proficiency in mathematics, to which and to scientific pursuits he devoted all his leisure. In 1638 he published anonymously his first work, wherein he attempted to prove that the moon was a habitable world. In a subsequent edition he added a chapter on the possibility of it being reached by volitation. A second work, showing the probability of the earth being a planet, appeared in 1640. During his stay in London as a chaplain he was an active promoter of the weekly meetings which, as early as 1645, were held by ‘divers worthy persons inquisitive into natural philosophy and other parts of human learning, and particularly of what hath been called the new philosophy or experimental philosophy.’ These gatherings of philosophers, the ‘Invisible College’ of Robert Boyle, were the beginnings of the Royal Society.
Wilkins adhered to the parliamentary side during the civil war and took the covenant. In April 1648, having previously qualified himself by taking his B.D. degree, he was made warden of Wadham College, in the place of the ejected Dr. John Pitt, by the visitors appointed by parliament to reform the university of Oxford. He did not graduate D.D. till 18 Dec. 1649, having been dispensed from taking this degree within the statutable time ‘in consequence of his attendance on the prince elector.’ Then, or at a later period, Wilkins visited Heidelberg to wait upon the prince, who had been restored to his dominions by the peace of Westphalia.
Wilkins at once took a leading position in the government of the university. He became a member of the various delegacies and committees appointed to carry out the will of the party in power. His subscription to the engagement had secured him the support of the independents, and on 16 Oct. 1652 he was made one of the five commis-
