(16 Feb. 1830) it was burnt to the ground. In 1834, in the rebuilt house, Wrench and Keeley made a great hit in Oxenford's ‘I and my Double.’ On 30 Oct. at the Haymarket he was the first Caleb Chizzler in ‘But however’ by Henry Mayhew and Henry Baylis. In 1840 Wrench was at the Olympic. His last engagement was at the Haymarket. On 24 Oct. 1843 he died at his lodgings in Pickett Place, London, in his sixty-sixth year. Wrench and Manly, an actor, were engaged respectively to Miss and Mrs. Taylor of Nottingham, but ultimately changed partners, Wrench marrying Mrs. Taylor and Manly her daughter. Wrench's marriage was not happy. He was charged with leaving his wife necessitous while he indulged in tavern dissipations. His wife had formerly, as Mrs. Taylor, been an actress of some ability (see Thespian Dictionary, under Taylor [Mrs. Robinson]).
In the country Wrench played a large round of comic characters, including Charles Surface, Dr. Pangloss, Captain Absolute, and many others. Wrench was a good comedian, but never reached the first rank. Oxberry, who played with him at many theatres, speaks of him as knock-kneed, and says that, adopting Elliston as model, he copied his nasal twang and drawling doubtful delivery, mistook abruptness for humour, and was less a gentleman on the stage than a ‘blood.’
Wrench was medium height, light complexioned, with high shoulders and flat features. A portrait of him, by Sharpe, as Wing in ‘Amateurs and Actors,’ and one by De Wilde as Sir Freeman in ‘Free and Easy,’ are in the Mathews collection in the Garrick. His portrait as Belmour is in Oxberry's ‘Dramatic Biography,’ and as Benedick in the ‘Theatrical Inquisitor’ for January 1814.
[Oxberry's Dramatic Biography, vol. iv.; Genest's Account of the English Stage; Dramatic and Musical Review, November 1843; Theatrical Inquisitor, vol. iv.; Memoirs of Munden; Donaldson's Recollections of an Actor; Authentic Memoirs of the Green Room, n.d. (1814); Theatrical Looker on, Birmingham, 1823; Biography of the British Stage, 1824; Gent. Mag. 1844, i. 438.]
WRENN, RALPH (d. 1692), commodore, was on 18 April 1672 appointed commander of the Hopewell fireship, and in the following year of the Rose dogger. After the peace with Holland he was lieutenant of the Reserve; in 1677 he had command of the fireship Young Spragge; in 1679 he was lieutenant of the Kingfisher in the Mediterranean with Morgan Kempthorne [see under Kempthorne, Sir John], and was so still in May 1681, when she fought a brilliant action with seven Algerine pirates. After Kempthorne's death Wrenn took the command and beat off the enemy. His gallantry was rewarded by his promotion to the command of the Nonsuch on 9 Aug. 1681. In May 1682 he was moved into the Centurion, to which, still in the Mediterranean, he was reappointed in May 1685. In 1687–8 he commanded the Mary Rose, and in September 1688 he was appointed to the Greenwich, one of the ships at the Nore with Lord Dartmouth during the critical October [see Legge, George, Lord Dartmouth]; from this appointment he was superseded after the revolution. In 1690, however, he was appointed to the Norwich of forty-eight guns, and in October 1691 was ordered out to the West Indies in succession to Lawrence Wright [q. v.] He sailed from Plymouth on 26 Dec., and after a most favourable passage arrived at Barbados on 16 Jan. 1691–2, when his force consisted of the Mary and, besides the Norwich, five 4th-rates, ships of from forty to fifty guns. He had orders to send one of these with the trade to Jamaica; but, receiving intelligence that the French were in greater force than had been supposed, he detached two on this duty. Then, on a report that a squadron of nine French ships was cruising off Barbados, he strengthened his force with two hired merchant ships, and put to sea on 30 Jan. Not meeting with the enemy in a cruise of five days, he returned to Barbados, and, apprehending that the whole French fleet had gone to Jamaica, he sailed again on 17 Feb. On the 21st off Desirade he sighted the French fleet of more than three times his strength—eighteen ships of from forty to sixty guns, with some six or seven fireships and tenders. In face of such odds, Wrenn drew back, but was the next morning attacked by their full force. After a sharp action of four hours' duration, Wrenn found himself able to draw off and retire unpursued—‘the bravest action performed in the West Indies during the war’ (Lediard, p. 655). He returned to Barbados, where a sickness carried off a great many of the men, and, among others, Wrenn himself.
[Charnock's Biogr. Nav. i. 880; Lediard's Naval Hist. pp. 653–5; Colomb's Naval Warfare (1st ed.), pp. 258–9.]
WREY, Sir BOURCHIER (d. 1696), duellist, son of Sir Chichester Wrey, second baronet, by Anne, widow of Lionel Cranfield, earl of Middlesex, and daughter and coheiress of Edward Bourchier, fourth earl of Bath (d. 1636). The Wreys had lived for generations at Trebigh, Cornwall, but by the marriage
