William Boscawen

William Boscawen, translator of Horace and founder of the literary fund, was a younger son of General George Boscawen; he attended Eton (1760-1770) and matriculated at Exeter College Oxford (1770) as a gentleman-commoner, though he attended the Middle Temple to study law (1769). Boscawen was a commissioner in the Victualing Office (1785), and has a poem in Probationary Odes for the Laureateship (1785). He published legal texts and contributed notes to James Bland Burges's Richard I, written in Spenserians. Boscawen was a founder of the Literary Fund and a regular contributor to the British Critic.

TEXT RECORDS:

1785Probationary Odes No. XI. By Michael Angelo Taylor, Esq. M.P.
1799Ode for the Anniversary Meeting of the Subscribers to the Literary Fund.
1800Elegy on the Death of Dr. Joseph Warton.
1802Address to the Subscribers to the Literary Fund, at their Annual Anniversary Dinner, April 1, 1802.

PUBLICATIONS:

A treatise on convictions on penal statutes. 1792.
The odes, epodes, carmen saeculare ... of Horace, translated. 1793.
The progress of satire, an essay in verse. 1798.
Poems for the anniversary of the literary fund. Contributor, 1800.
Poems by William Boscawen. 1801.

PROFILE AND
ASSOCIATES:

English
Anglican

Eton College
Exeter College Oxford
Middle Temple
Inns of Court

lawyer
poet
translator

Gentleman's Magazine
British Critic

Sir James Bland Burges
Thomas Dermody
William Thomas Fitzgerald
John Taylor Esq.

REFERENCE:

DNB; not NCBEL.

"Boscawen's Horace" American Monthly Review 1 (February 1795) 165-72; David Rivers, Literary Memoirs of Living Authors (1798); Mathias, Pursuits of Literature, 4th Dialogue; Poetical Register for 1801 (1802), 1802 (1803), 1803 (1804), 1804 (1805), 1805 (1807), 1806-07 (1811); obituary in Monthly Magazine 31 (May 1811) 480; obituary in Gentleman's Magazine 81 (May 1811) 500-01; obituary in Literary Panorama 10 (December 1811) 1248-49; Annual Register for 1811 (1811) 160; Alexander Chalmers, General Biographical Dictionary (1812-17); John Nichols, Literary Anecdotes (1812-15) 9:240; Robert Watt, Bibliotheca Britannica (1824); Richard Polwhele, Biographical Sketches in Cornwall (1831) 2:80-81; Tregellas, Cornish Worthies; Allibone, Critical Dictionary of English Literature (1858-71; 1882); Foster, Alumni Oxon (1887-91); Eton College Register, 1753-1790 (1921).

COMMENTARY RECORDS
for William Boscawen:

1.	1798  Thomas James Mathias, in Pursuits of Literature (1798) 245 & n.
2.	1800  Robert Southey to Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1 January 1800; New Letters, ed. Curry (1965) 1:213-14.
3.	1801  Anonymous, in Review of Boscawen, Poems; Anti-Jacobin Review 9 (May 1801) 59-60.
4.	1801  Anonymous, Review of Boscawen, Poems; Poetical Register for 1801 (1802) 437-38.
5.	1811  William Thomas Fitzgerald, "A Triubute of Friendship to the Memory of William Boscawen, Esq." Morning Post (17 May 1811).
6.	1831  Richard Polwhele, in Biographical Sketches in Cornwall (1831) 2:80.
7.	1832  John Taylor Esq., in Records of my Life (1832) 1:388-89.

BIOGRAPHY RECORDS
for William Boscawen:

1.	1798  David Rivers, in Literary Memoirs of Living Authors (1798) 1:61-62.
2.	1811  Anonymous, Obituary in Monthly Magazine 31 (May 1811) 480.
3.	1811  Anonymous, Obituary in Gentleman's Magazine 81 (May 1811) 500-01.
4.	1812  Alexander Chalmers, in General Biographical Dictionary (1812-17) 6:146-48.
5.	1815  John Nichols, in Literary Anecdotes of the XVIII Century (1812-15) 9:240.

AUTHOR AS CRITIC:
(commentary records)

1.	1800  Rev. Joseph Warton:   William Boscawen, "Elegy on the Death of Dr. Joseph Warton" Gentleman's Magazine 70 (March 1800) 258-59.