Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Sheppard, Samuel
SHEPPARD, SAMUEL (fl. 1646), author, was the son of Harman Sheppard, physician, who died on 12 July 1639, aged 90, by his wife Petronilla, who died on 10 Sept. 1650. He was related to Sir Christopher Clapham of Beamish in Yorkshire, to whom he dedicated several of his books. He commenced his literary career about 1606 as amanuensis to Ben Jonson, but wrote nothing himself till a later period. He took holy orders, and, like his connections the Claphams, was an ardent royalist. He twice suffered imprisonment for his opinions, once in 1650 in Whittington College (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1649–50 p. 529, 1650 p. 143) and again for fourteen months in Newgate. His wife's name was Mary.
He was the author of: 1. ‘The Farmers Farmed,’ London, 1646, 4to. 2. ‘The False Alarm,’ London, 1646, 4to. 3. ‘The Year of Jubilee,’ London, 1646, 4to. 4. ‘The Times displayed in Six Sestyads,’ London, 1646, 4to. 5. ‘The Committee Man Curried,’ London, 1647, 4to (two short farces almost entirely made up of plagiarisms from Sir John Suckling). 6. ‘Grand Pluto's Progress through Great Britain,’ 1647 (Lilly's Catalogue, 1844). 7. ‘The Loves of Amandus and Sophronia,’ London, 1650, 8vo. 8. ‘Epigrams,’ London, 1651, 8vo. 9. ‘The Joviall Crew,’ London, 1651, 4to. 10. ‘Discoveries, or an Explication of some Enigmatic Verities. Also a Seraphick Rhapsodie on the Passion of Jesus Christ,’ London, 1652. 11. ‘Parliament Routed,’ London, 1653. Hazlitt (Handbook) also ascribes to him the preface to Captain Hobson's ‘Fallacy of Infant Baptism Discovered,’ London, 1645, 4to, together with ‘God and Mammon,’ 1646, 4to, ‘The Weepers,’ London, 1652, 4to, and a ballad, ‘St. George for England,’ London, 1650. All these pieces and Nos. 3, 4, 7, 8, and 9 are in the British Museum. Some lines by Sheppard preface Thomas Manly's ‘Veni, Vidi, Vici,’ London, 1652, 8vo, and he left in manuscript (now in the Bodleian Library) ‘The Fairy King.’
[Author's works; Corser's Collectanea Anglo-Poetica, v. 5, 232; Hunter's Chorus Vatum, i. 104; Notes and Queries, 5th ser. iii. 245, vi. 104; Baker's Biogr. Dram. i. 654, ii. 115; Chester's London Marriage Licenses, ed. Foster. p. 1582.]