John Hookham Frere | |
|---|---|
 John Hookham Frere, byJohn Hoppner (1806) | |
| Born | (1769-05-21)21 May 1769 London, England |
| Died | 7 January 1846(1846-01-07) (aged 76) |
| Education | Eton College |
| Alma mater | Caius College, Cambridge, England |
| Occupation(s) | diplomat and author |
| Spouse | |
| Parents |
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| Relatives | Ellenor Fenn (aunt) |
John Hookham FrerePC (21 May 1769 – 7 January 1846) was an English diplomat and author.
Frere was born in London. His father,John Frere, a member of aSuffolk family, had been educated atCaius College, Cambridge, and becameSecond Wrangler in 1763. His mother, Jane, daughter of John Hookham, a rich London merchant, was cultured and wrote verse in private. His father's sisterEllenor, who marriedSir John Fenn, editor of thePaston Letters, wrote educational works for children under the pseudonyms "Mrs Lovechild" and "Mrs Teachwell". Young Frere was sent toEton College in 1785, and there began a friendship withGeorge Canning which greatly affected his life. From Eton, he went to his father's college at Cambridge, and graduated BA in 1792 and MA in 1795.[1] He entered public service in the foreign office underLord Grenville, and sat from 1796 to 1802 as Member of Parliament for the borough ofWest Looe in Cornwall.[2]
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From his boyhood he had admiredWilliam Pitt the Younger, and along with Canning he entered into the defence of his government, and contributed to the pages of theAnti-Jacobin, edited by Gifford. He contributed, in collaboration with Canning,The Loves of the Triangles, a parody ofErasmus Darwin'sLoves of the Plants,The Needy Knife-Grinder andThe Rovers. On Canning's promotion to theboard of trade in 1809 he succeeded him asUnder-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. In October 1800, he was appointed envoy toLisbon; and in September 1802 he was transferred toMadrid, where he remained for two years. He was recalled on account of a personal disagreement he had withSpanish Prime Minister Godoy, but the ministry showed its approval of his action with a pension of £1,700 a year.[2]
Frere was made a member of thePrivy Council in 1805. In 1807 he was appointedplenipotentiary at Berlin, but the mission was abandoned, and Frere was sent to Spain in 1808 as plenipotentiary to theCentral Junta. The condition of Spain rendered his position difficult. WhenNapoleon began to advance on Madrid, it became a matter of great importance to decide whether SirJohn Moore, who was then in the north of Spain, should occupy the capital or retreat, and if he did retreat whether he should go to Portugal or toGalicia. Frere strongly felt that the bolder was the better course, and he urged his views with an urgent and fearless persistency that on sometimes overstepped the limits of his commission. After the disastrous retreat toA Coruña, the public accused Frere of having endangered the British army; though no direct censure was passed upon his conduct by the government, he was recalled, andMarquess Wellesley was appointed in his place.[2]
This ended Frere's public life. He afterwards refused to go toSt Petersburg as ambassador, and twice declined apeerage. In 1816, he married Elizabeth Jemima Hay,dowagerCountess of Erroll. In 1820, on account of her failing health, he went with her toMalta, where he lived for the rest of his life. In retirement, he devoted himself to literature, studied his favourite Greek authors, and taught himselfHebrew andMaltese.[2] He welcomed English guests, was popular with his Maltese neighbours, and befriendedMikiel Anton Vassalli, the first Professor of Maltese at theUniversity of Malta. He died at Villa Frere inPietà close toValletta and is buried atMsida Bastion Cemetery.
In 1833–34, as President of the General Council of the University of Malta, he donated eighty-five volumes of medical books to the Public Library collection with the specific intention of being "for the use of the young students of the medical art".
Frere's literary reputation now rests upon his verse translations ofAristophanes. The translations ofThe Acharnians,The Knights,The Birds, andThe Frogs were privately printed, and were first brought into general notice byGeorge Cornewall Lewis in theClassical Museum for 1847. They were followed byTheognis Restilutus, the personal history of the poetTheognis of Megara. In 1817, he published a mock-heroic Arthurian poem,Prospectus and Specimen of an intended National Work [pl], by William and Robert Whistlecraft, of Stowmarket in Suffolk, Harness and Collar Makers,.[3]William Tennant inAnster Fair used theottava rima for semi-burlesque poetry five years earlier, but Frere's experiment is interesting becauseByron borrowed it inDon Juan.[2]
Frere's complete works were published in 1871, with a memoir by his nephews, WE andSir Henry Bartle Frere.[2]
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Frere, John Hookham".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 11 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 207.
Cousin, John William (1910), "Frere, John Hookham",A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature, London: J. M. Dent & Sons – viaWikisource
Media related toJohn Hookham Frere at Wikimedia Commons
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| Preceded by | British Minister to Prussia 1807–1808 | Succeeded by |