John Walker (biographer)
John Walker (1674–1747) was an English clergyman and ecclesiastical historian, known for his biographical work on the Church of England priests during the English Civil War and Interregnum.
Life
The son of Endymion Walker, he was baptised at St Kerrian's, Exeter, 21 January 1674. His father was mayor of Exeter in 1682. On 19 November 1691 he matriculated at Exeter College, Oxford, he was admitted Fellow on 3 July 1695, and became full Fellow on 4 July 1696 (vacated 1700).
On 16 January 1698 he was ordained deacon by
By diploma of 7 December 1714 Walker was made D.D. at Oxford, and on 20 December he was appointed to a
Sufferings of the Clergy
The publication of
Walker gathered particulars by help of query sheets, circulated in various dioceses; those for Exeter and Canterbury were printed by Calamy.[2] Among his helpers was Mary Astell. His manuscript collections were presented to the Bodleian Library in 1754 by Walker's son William, a druggist in Exeter; the lost ‘Minutes of the Bury Presbyterian Classis’ (Chetham Society, 1896) were edited from the transcript in the Walker manuscripts.
Walker's book Sufferings of the Clergy appeared in 1714,[3] The subscription list contained over thirteen hundred names. The work consists of two parts:
- a history of ecclesiastical affairs from 1640 to 1660, the object being to show that the ejection of the Puritans at the Restoration was a just reprisal for their actions when in power;
- a catalogue of the deprived clergy with particulars of their sufferings.
It does not profess to give biographies; the list of names adds up to 3,334 (Calamy's ejected add up to 2,465), but if all the names of the suffering clergy could be recovered, Walker thinks they might reach ten thousand (i. 200). A third part, announced in the title-page as an examination of Calamy's work, was deferred (pref. p. li), and never appeared; Calamy is plentifully attacked in the preface. Walker tried to distinguish doubtful from authenticated matter, and mentions the charges brought against some of his sufferers; but his tone was counter-productive to his argument.
The work was hailed by
An ‘Epitome’ of the Attempt was published at Oxford, 1862. A small abridgment of the Attempt, with biographical additions and an introduction by Robert Whittaker, was published in 1863 under the title The Sufferings of the Clergy.
List of publications
- Sufferings of the Clergy, archive.org text
References
- Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900. .
Notes
- ^ "Walker, John (WLKR702J)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
- ^ Church and Dissenters Compar'd, 1719, pp. 4, 10.
- ^ An Attempt towards recovering an Account of the Numbers and Sufferings of the Clergy of the Church of England, Heads of Colleges, Fellows, Scholars, &c., who were Sequester'd, Harass'd, &c. in the late Times of the Grand Rebellion: Occasion'd by the Ninth Chapter (now the second volume) of Dr. Calamy's Abridgment of the Life of Mr. Baxter. Together with an Examination of That Chapter.
- Attribution
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: "Walker, John (1674-1747)". Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.