Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 63.djvu/436

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ZOON, JAN FRANZ VAN (1658–1718?), painter. [See Van Son.]


ZOONE, WILLIAM (fl. 1540–1575), jurist and cartographer. [See Soone.]


ZOUCH. [See also Zouche.]


ZOUCH, HENRY (1725?–1795), antiquary and social reformer, was the eldest surviving son of Charles Zouch (d. 1754), vicar of Sandal Magna, near Wakefield, and elder brother of Thomas Zouch [q. v.] He was educated at Wakefield school under the Rev. Benjamin Wilson, and was admitted pensioner at Trinity College, Cambridge, on 9 April 1743. He graduated B.A. in 1746 and M.A. in 1750. The set of English verses contributed by him to the Cambridge collection on the peace of 1748 is included in the ‘Works of Thomas Zouch’ (i. 362–5). He translated into Greek a number of the odes of Horace. As a scholar he was much praised by Dr. Parr.

Zouch was vicar of his native parish of Sandal Magna from 1754 to 1789. Towards the close of his life the first stone of a new church at Wakefield was laid by him (Beauties of England, Yorkshire, p. 803), and from 8 June 1758 to 31 Dec. 1764 he was governor of Wakefield school. In 1788 he succeeded his brother-in-law, Sir William Lowther, in the rectory of Swillington, which he held until his death. He was also rector of Tankersley in Yorkshire, and chaplain to the Marchioness of Rockingham. Long letters of the marquis to him are in the thirteenth report of the historical manuscripts commission (pt. vii. pp. 136–9). As a magistrate of the West Riding his zeal never flagged, but he was of an odd nature. He died on 17 June 1795, and on 21 June ‘was buried in his own garden’ (Notes and Queries, 8th ser. iii. 125, 198). He married Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of William Spinke of Wakefield; she died in the spring of 1796, leaving no issue (Hunter, Familiæ, Harl. Soc. ii. 750, 783).

Zouch was author of:

  1. ‘Remarks upon the late Resolution of the House of Commons respecting the proposed Change of the Poor Laws’ [1776].
  2. ‘English Freeholder's Address to his Countrymen’ (anon.), 1780.
  3. ‘A few Words in Behalf of the Poor, being Remarks upon a Plan of Mr. Gilbert for improving the Police,’ 1782.
  4. ‘Account of the present Daring Practices of Night-hunters and Poachers,’ 1783.
  5. ‘Hints on the Public Police,’ 1786.
  6. ‘Remarks on a Bill of Sir William Young for preventing Vexatious Removals,’ 1789.

Lord Loughborough's ‘Observations on the State of English Prisons and the Means of improving them’ (1793) were communicated to and revised by Zouch.

Walpole's letters to Zouch (3 Aug. 1758 to 13 March 1787) were, through the favour of Lord Lonsdale (Zouch's kinsman and executor), added to the ‘Letters to the Earl of Hertford,’ edited by Croker in 1825. They are included in Cunningham's edition of Walpole's ‘Letters’ from vol. iii. p. 146.

[Whitaker's Loidis, i. 260; Gent. Mag. 1795 i. 534, ii. 700, 1796 i. 356; Peacock's Wakefield School, pp. 102, 211; Hist. MSS. Comm. 13th Rep. App. vii. 133–4, 151; information from Dr. Aldis Wright, Trinity College, Cambridge.]

W. P. C.


ZOUCH, THOMAS (1737–1815), divine and antiquary, who thought himself allied to the noble family of Zouche, was younger son of Charles Zouch, vicar of Sandal Magna, near Wakefield (d. 27 July 1754), who married, on 14 July 1719, Dorothy, daughter of Gervase Norton of Wakefield; she died on 17 March 1760, aged 64.

Thomas was born at Sandal Magna on 12 Sept. 1737, and, after receiving the rudiments of a classical education from his father, was sent to the free grammar school of Wakefield, under John Clarke (1706–1761) [q. v.] He was admitted pensioner at Trinity College, Cambridge, on 8 July 1756, under the tutorship of Stephen Whisson, and became scholar of his college on 6 May 1757. He won a Craven scholarship in 1760, and graduated B.A. in 1761. His name is printed as third in the list of wranglers for that year, but he himself claimed the second position. Possibly one of the two graduates above him had received, as was not uncommon at that date, an honorary degree. Zouch proceeded M.A. in 1764, and D.D. in 1805.

Zouch remained at Cambridge until 1770. He was ordained deacon in 1761, and for two years gained the members' prize for a Latin essay—in 1762 as a middle bachelor, and in 1763 as a senior bachelor. In 1762 he was elected minor fellow of his college, and became major fellow in 1764, sub-lector primus 1765–6, and lector linguæ Latinæ 1768. He was also appointed assistant tutor, at an annual salary of 60l., to Thomas Postlethwaite [q. v.], and in addition took private pupils, among whom was Pepper Arden, baron Alvanley. On 8 Feb. 1768 he delivered in the college chapel a funeral oration in Latin on the death of Robert Smith, the master. The official verses on the accession of George III contained a Latin poem by him; to those on that king's marriage he contributed a Greek poem, and he supplied English verses for the sets on