YONGE. [See also Young.]
YONGE, CHARLES DUKE (1812–1891), regius professor of modern history and English literature in Queen's College, Belfast, was eldest son of Charles Yonge (d. 1830), a lower master at Eton, and was born there on 30 Nov. 1812. His father was great-great-grandson of James Yonge (1646–1721) [q. v.] His mother was Elizabeth, daughter of Joseph Lord of Pembroke. He received his school education at Eton, whence he went as a foundation scholar to King's College, Cambridge, in 1830. Leaving it, however, he was admitted to St. Mary Hall, Oxford, on 17 May 1834, and graduated B.A. with first-class honours in classics in December 1835 (M.A. 1874). After taking pupils and doing literary work in London and elsewhere he was in 1866 appointed by the crown professor of history and English literature in Queen's College, Belfast, and this chair he held till his death on 30 Nov. 1891. He was buried in Drumbeg churchyard, near Belfast.
Yonge married, in 1837, Anne, daughter of J. V. Bethell, but had no issue.
Yonge was a most prolific writer. From 1844 till his death his pen was seldom idle. The following is a list of his principal works:
- ‘Exercises for Verses,’ pt. i. (all published), 1844.
- ‘An English-Greek Lexicon,’ 1849.
- ‘Exercises in Greek Prose Composition,’ 1850.
- ‘Exercises in Latin Prose Composition,’ 1850.
- ‘Key to Exercises in Latin Prose Composition,’ 1851.
- ‘Key to Exercises in Greek Prose Composition,’ 1851.
- ‘Introduction to the Latin Tongue,’ 1851.
- ‘Exempla Majora Græca,’ 1851.
- ‘Exempla Majora Latina,’ 1851.
- ‘Exempla Minora Græca,’ 1851.
- ‘Exempla Minora Latina,’ 1851.
- ‘A Latin Grammar,’ 1852.
- ‘Questions adapted to the Eton Latin Grammar,’ 1852.
- ‘A Phraseological English-Latin Dictionary,’ 1855.
- ‘A History of England from the Earliest Times to the Peace of Paris,’ 1856.
- ‘A Dictionary of Epithets,’ 1856.
- ‘Parallel Lives of Ancient and Modern Heroes, of Epaminondas and Gustavus Adolphus, Philip of Macedon and Frederick the Great,’ 1858.
- ‘Life of F. M. the Duke of Wellington,’ 1860, 2 vols.
- An edition of ‘Virgil’ with notes, 1862.
- ‘A History of the British Navy from the Earliest Period to the Present Time,’ 1863, 2 vols.
- ‘An abridged English-Greek Lexicon,’ 1864.
- ‘Taylor's (W. C.) Student's Manual of Modern History,’ revised and edited, 1866.
- ‘History of France under the Bourbons,’ 1866.
- ‘Life and Administration of Robert Banks, second Earl of Liverpool,’ 1868, 3 vols.
- ‘Three Centuries of English Literature,’ 1872.
- ‘Three Centuries of Modern History,’ 1872.
- ‘History of the English Revolution of 1688,’ 1874.
- ‘Life of Marie-Antoinette, Queen of France,’ 1876, 2 vols.
- ‘The Seven Heroines of Christendom,’ 1878.
- ‘A Short English Grammar,’ 1879.
- ‘The Constitutional History of England from 1760 to 1860,’ 1881.
- ‘Goldsmith's Essays, selected and edited,’ 1882.
- ‘Our Great Naval Commanders,’ 1884.
- ‘Selected Letters of Horace Walpole,’ 1890, 2 vols.
- ‘Our Great Military Commanders,’ 1892.
- ‘Selected Essays from Dryden,’ 1892.
He also executed various translations for Bohn's classical, antiquarian, and ecclesiastical libraries.
[Personal knowledge; information supplied by Yonge's nephew, Mr. John H. Yonge, Worcester; Burke's Landed Gentry, s.v. ‘Yonge of Puslinch.’]
YONGE, Sir GEORGE, bart. (1731–1812), governor of the Cape of Good Hope, only surviving son of Sir William Yonge [q. v.], Walpole's secretary of state for war, was educated at Eton and Leipzig. He was in 1754 returned to parliament as member for Honiton, which he continuously represented (except from 1761–3) in successive parliaments till 1796. He is said to have spent enormous sums upon his constituency, and in an attempt to establish a woollen factory at Ottery St. Mary. From 1766 to 1770 he was one of the lords of the admiralty, from April to July 1782 he was vice-treasurer for Ireland, was secretary for war from July 1782 to April 1783, and again from December 1783 to July 1794, and master of the mint from July 1794 to February 1799, when he was appointed governor of the Cape of Good Hope. He was nominated a K.B. in 1788. He was thus a man of long official experience when, on 9 Dec. 1799, he arrived at Cape Town; but it was an experience that had no special bearing on the work he had undertaken, and he was probably too old to fall readily into new lines of thought and conduct. His government was marked by want of tact and judgment; he quarrelled with General Francis Dundas [q. v.], the officer in command of the troops, whose authority he attempted to usurp; he offended the old Dutch settlers by increased taxes, contrary, it was alleged, to the capitulation; he left the administration of affairs almost entirely in the hands of Mr. Blake, his private secretary, and Lieutenant-colonel Cockburn, his principal aide-de-camp, whose influence and support were believed to be marketable commodities.
