the 1796 list

Submitted by edpope on

The so-called "1796 list" is at the end of Vol VII of Godwin's diary on folios 45 to 48 after the diary entry for 24.9.1796 and is transcribed on the GD website after that day. There is an earlier version of it in Abinger c 31 f 90-92 readable online in the Western Manuscripts section of the Bodleian Library website / e-Resources / All Resources, which goes nearly to the end of 1794 and probably dates from soon after 1.11.1794 (when its last name, Wharton, appeared in the diary). The version in the diary is preceded by a sort of top twenty-five list of Godwin's acquaintances on f 45v against which he wrote the year he met them and then numbered them in chronological order. The names in the list correspond closely though not exactly to the names underlined in the full list which starts on f 46v. To see the underlines you have to look at the original diary pages as the GD website has not transcribed them. In the 1794 version some names are also underlined and again these correspond closely but not exactly to the underlined names in the 1796 list. By matching the 1794 and 1796 list with the diary entries, a lot of identifications can be made firmer. Some of the names in the 1796 list (and from the middle of 1796 nearly all of them) have not been coded to their person record on the GD website, even though their diary entries have been, and I have made entries for such people on my website even if just to point out that fact. There was also a list of 17 names at the end of Vol VI of the diary after the entry for 20.4.1793, but probably dating from after 2.2.1794 when Godwin first met Parr, the last name in the list and which shows no sign of having been added later. The names were in the chronological order that Godwin met them - two of the names, Fordyce and Dyson, have been inserted above. Twelve of them also appeared in the list of 25, but five were dropped from that list (Fordyce, Barry, Stuart, Priestley and Logan) and seven - previous to Parr - were added (mrs Barbauld, Wolcot, miss Williams, Clementi, Crosdill, Inchbald and Merry) an interesting shift to include females and to prefer music over painting and lighter poetry over history and theology.

With one exception all the names in the list of 25 are underlined in both 1794 and 1796 lists (the last five in date order Godwin met after 1794 so are not in the 1794 list). The exception is Priestley who is underlined in the 1794 list but not in the 1796 list. There are three names not included in the 25 but probably added later, in the top right hand corner of the page, J Fordyce, G Stuart and J Logan, and they are all underlined in both 1794 and 1796 lists. Beneath them is a list of people who don't appear in the lists at all. They seem to be people Godwin considered important but didn't consider he'd met. Two of them appeared in the diary before 1796, Erskine and Calonne, but perhaps in circumstances where Godwin didn't actually get to meet them. (Wolcot is in the list of 25 but Godwin later moved him in the 1796 list from 1787 to 1792, perhaps because their 1787 meeting was slight). Two others, Bentham and Cumberland, Godwin met much later, and two, Burke and Cowper, he seems never to have met.

People underlined in 1794 list but not underlined in 1796 list, or in list of 25: (Jos) Jacob, Richard Price, Bishop Watson, Dr White, Major Barry, James Heath, Henry Dibbin, William Sharp, John Gawler, James Glenie and Joseph Ritson.

People in 1794 list but not in 1796 list: 1787 Richardson (inserted above then crossed out) / Macklin (crossed out) / Nicol / 1788 Locatelli / Wilson / miss Weston 1789 Shipley / 1790 Nollekens / Staunton / Reveley / Hawke / F North / 1793 Sinclair / Richter (but H Richter is in 1796 list for 1794) / 1794 Macarthy

People in 1796 list up to 1.11.1794 but not in 1794 list: 1773 Morgan / Gregson / 1774 Evans / 1782 Ford (underlined) / 1788 Baillie (inserted above) / 1793 Gonzaga / 1794 Hall / Losh / Nugent / Northmore / H Richter (but Richter is in 1794 list for 1793) / Hazlitt / Iliff (underlined)

People underlined in 1796 list but not underlined in 1794 list: 1791 Wolstencraft / 1793 T Wedgwood / M Reveley / 1794 Salomon (but later crossed out, the only underlined name to be crossed out except in order to move them to a different place in the list) / Berkeley Craven

A list of six names at the bottom of the list of 25 all but the first of whom Godwin met after September 1796: Smirke (met in 1795), Fitzpatrick, Reynolds, O'Connor, Kemble and Hoppner. All except the last are underlined in the 1796 list

People underlined in the 1796 list after 1.11.1794 and before 24.9.1796 but not in 1796 list: 1794 Coleridge / 1795 Wordsworth / Carlisle / 1796 mrs Robinson

People underlined in the 1796 list after 24.9.1796 but not in list of 25 or the 6 names at bottom of it: 1796 Fuseli / 1797 Bage / G Fordyce / Charlotte Smith / 1798 H Lee / Grattan / 1799 Curran / Davy / 1800 Lamb. After this there are no more underlines except a faint one under Kirwan (1800)