Aislabie, William (1699/1700–1781), landscape designer and landowner, was probably born at Studley Royal in the West Riding of Yorkshire, the son of John Aislabie (1670–1742), politician, and his first wife, Anne (d. 1700), daughter of Sir William Rawlinson of Hendon, Middlesex. Details of his education are unknown, beyond that he went on a grand tour in 1720. In 1721 he was returned as an MP for ...
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Anderson, James (1738–1809), surgeon and horticulturist, was born on 17 January 1738 at Long Hermiston near Edinburgh, the son of Andrew Anderson, a local doctor. He attended the village school at Ratho and studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh. He was a surgeon on an ...
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Rosalind Mitchison
Anderson, James (1739–1808), agriculturist and political economist, born at Hermiston, near Edinburgh, inherited the tenancy of a large farm there at the age of fifteen when his parents (whose names are unknown) died. He had already prepared himself for the position by attending ...
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Andrews, Robert (1725–1806), landowner and subject of a painting by Thomas Gainsborough, was born at Bulmer, Essex, on 10 November 1725, the son of Robert Andrews (1661–1735) and his fourth wife, Martha (d. 1749), the daughter of James Brewster (d. 1725)...
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Arkwright, Richard (1755–1843), cotton manufacturer and landowner, was born on 19 December 1755 at Bolton, Lancashire, the only son of Sir Richard Arkwright (1732–1792), cotton manufacturer, and his wife, Patience (d. 1756), daughter of Robert Holt. In 1780 he married Mary (...
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Ashby, Joseph (1859–1919), farmer and social reformer, was born in Tysoe in Warwickshire on 13 June 1859, the son of an unmarried servant, Elizabeth Ashby. His father was the husband of Elizabeth's mistress, yet, common as such births were, Ashby's was in some ways different. His father provided for him but his mother, a fiercely independent woman, refused to use the money. More importantly his mother's branch of the ...
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John Turner
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Astor, William Waldorf, first Viscount Astor (1848–1919), property owner and newspaper proprietor, was born on 31 March 1848 in New York, the only child of John Jacob Astor (1822–1890), manager of the family estate, and his wife, Charlotte Augusta Gibbes (1825–1887). He was educated privately and at ...
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Atkinson, Sir Harry Albert (1831–1892), farmer and premier of New Zealand, was born on 1 November 1831 at Broxton, Cheshire, the fourth son and the seventh of the thirteen children of John Atkinson (1798–1856), an architect and stonemason, and his wife, Elizabeth Smith (...
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Barbara C. Murison
Baillie, George, of Jerviswood (1664–1738), landowner and politician, born on 16 March 1664 at Jerviswood Tower, Lanarkshire, was the eldest child of Robert Baillie (d. 1684) and of his wife and cousin Rachel Johnston (d. 1697), daughter of the Presbyterian martyr Sir Archibald Johnston, ...
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Bakewell, Robert (1725–1795), stock breeder and farmer, was born at Dishley Grange, Dishley (otherwise Dixley), near Loughborough, Leicestershire, on 23 May 1725. His father, also a farmer, had been born at the same place and rented a farm there of 440 acres. About 1755 ...
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Toby Musgrave
Barnes, James (bap. 1806, d. 1877), gardener, was born at Farnham, Surrey, where he was baptized on 6 July 1806, the son of Stephen Barnes (1778–1852) and his wife, Susanna Norton (1781/2–1855). His father was head gardener at Willey House...
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M. C. Curthoys
Barr, Peter (1826–1909), seedsman and nurseryman, was born at Govan, Lanarkshire, on 20 April 1826, the seventh of twelve sons of James Barr, owner of a muslin weaving mill, and his wife, Mary, née Findlay. When his father's business suffered a financial setback the sons had to find work and ...
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Roland Thorne
Basset, Francis, Baron de Dunstanville and first Baron Basset (1757–1835), politician and landowner, was born at Walcot, Oxfordshire, on 9 August 1757, first-born of two sons and five daughters of Francis Basset (1715–1769), MP and landowner, of Tehidy, Cornwall, and his wife, Margaret...
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Richard B. Sheridan
Beckford, William (1744–1799), sugar planter and historian, was born in Jamaica in 1744, the son and heir of Richard Beckford (d. 1756) and his common-law wife, Elizabeth Hay. His uncle was William Beckford, lord mayor of London, and his first cousin was ...
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Richard B. Sheridan
Beckford, William (bap. 1709, d. 1770), planter and politician, was baptized on 19 December 1709, in Jamaica, the son of Peter Beckford (1672/3–1735), sugar planter, speaker of the Jamaica house of assembly, and comptroller of customs, and Bathshua, daughter and coheir of Julines Hering...
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Jonathan Brown
Bell, Patrick (1799–1869), Church of Scotland minister and inventor of agricultural machinery, was born in April 1799 at mid-Leoch, in the parish of Auchterhouse, a few miles north-west of Dundee. He was one of at least two sons of George Bell, a tenant farmer at ...
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Charlotte Erickson
Birkbeck, Morris (1764–1825), farmer and writer, was born on 23 January 1764 in Settle, Yorkshire, the only child of Morris Birkbeck (1734–1816), Quaker minister, and his wife, Hannah, née Bradford, of Lancaster, who died a few days after his birth. On 23 April in 1794 he married ...
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Charlotte Mitchell
Blackmore, Richard Doddridge (1825–1900), novelist and fruit farmer, was born on 7 June 1825, at the vicarage, Longworth, Berkshire, the third but second surviving son of the Revd John Blackmore (1794–1858) and his first wife, Anne Basset Knight (1794–1825). Anne was the eldest daughter of the ...
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Blith, Walter (bap. 1605, d. 1654), writer on husbandry, was baptized on 7 August 1605 in Allesley, Warwickshire, the fourth and youngest son of John Blith (d. 1626), yeoman farmer, and Ann, daughter of Barnaby Holbeche of Birchley Hall, Fillongley. His father, a relatively prosperous cereal and dairy farmer, had moved to ...
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Francesca Greenoak
Bloom, Alan Herbert Vauser (1906–2005), horticulturist, was born on 19 November 1906 in Over, near Swavesey, Cambridgeshire, the son of Charles Herbert Bloom, grocer and draper, and later market gardener, and his wife, Katherine Annie Jane, née Whitworth. His father's family is thought to have been descended from Huguenots who had come to ...
