The Letters of Joseph Ritson, Ed. [By J. Frank]. to Which Is Prefixed a Memoir of the Author by Sir H. Nicolas (Volume 1)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1833. Excerpt: ... MEMOIR OF JOSEPH RITSON. dicere verum quid vetat. Joseph Ritson was the second, but eldest son1 that survived, of Joseph Ritson, of Stockton upon Tees, by his wife, Jane Gibson, and was born there on the 2nd of October, 1752. His family held lands, and ranked among the most respectable yeomanry at Hackthorpe and Great Strickland, in Westmoreland for four generations; but his pedi 1 His elder brother, Christopher, died an infant. The other children of Joseph Ritson and Jane Gibson, were John, Sarah, and Elizabeth, all of whom died young: Anne, who married Robert Frank, and was mother of Joseph Frank, esq. the editor of this collection of his uncles letters; Sarah, the wife of Mr. Jonathan Brown, of Liverpool; Jane, who married Mr. Thomas Thompson, of Great Strickland; and Mary. Vol. I. a gree cannot be traced with certainty beyond his great-grandfather, Christopher Ritson, who died in 1703.1 The name of Ritson, which is considered a corruption or contraction of Richardson, 2 is of some antiquity in Westmoreland and Cumberland, and occurs in the parish register of Lowther at its commencement about the year 1550. Ritsons first, and indeed only schoolmaster, was the rev. John Thompson, of Stockton, afterwards vicar of Warden, in Northumberland, who was accustomed to speak of him as one of his best scholars; and to relate some anecdotes indicative, even in his boyhood, of those mental eccentricities for which he was afterwards remarkable.3 Being destined for the law, he was articled to Mr. Raisbeck, a solicitor of Stockton, son-in-law of an eminent corn-merchant of that place, of the name of Robinson, with whom Ritsons father had long been connected in business.4 From Mr. Raisbecks office he was removed to that of Ralph Bradley, esq. a barrister, with the ...