William Hepworth Dixon

William Hepworth Dixon (30 June 1821 – 26 December 1879) was an English

Early life

Dixon was born on 30 June 1821, at

Dixon travelled in 1861 to Portugal, Spain and Morocco, and then in 1863 eastwards, returning to help in founding the Palestine Exploration Fund, of which he became an executive committee member and eventually chairman. In 1866 he travelled through the United States as far west as Salt Lake City. On the tour he lit upon a collection of state papers, originally Irish, in the public library at Philadelphia, which had been missing since the time of James II; on Dixon's suggestion it was passed to the British government.^[1][3]

In the autumn of 1867 Dixon travelled in the Baltic provinces, then in the latter part of 1869 spent some months in Russia and in 1871 mostly in Switzerland. Thereafter he was sent to Spain on a financial mission by a council of foreign bondholders. On 4 October 1872 he was created a knight commander of the Crown by

At the general election of 1868 Dixon declined an invitation to stand for Marylebone, though he often addressed political meetings. In August 1869 he resigned the editorship of the Athenæum. Soon afterwards he was appointed a justice of the peace for Middlesex and Westminster.^[1]

Dixon took a lead in establishing the Shaftesbury Park Estate, begun in 1872. This was intended to improve housing conditions for working-class residents. He supported a number of similar projects aimed at providing low-cost dwellings of decent standard for the families of labourers, and was a member of the first School Board for London (1870), working intensively on it in the first three years of its existence. Opposing Lord Sandon, he managed to carry a resolution establishing military-style foot drill as a form of physical education in all rate-paid schools in London.^[4][1]

About 1873 Dixon began campaigning to open the Tower of London free of charge to the public. To this the prime minister Benjamin Disraeli assented, and on public holidays Dixon personally conducted crowds of working men through the building.^[1]

Later life

Dixon lost most of his savings, invested in Turkish stock. On 2 October 1874 his house near Regent's Park, 6 St. James's Terrace, was wrecked by an explosion of gunpowder on Regent's Canal. He lost his eldest daughter, and his eldest son, William Jerrold Dixon, to a sudden death in Dublin, on 20 October 1879.^[1] However, his youngest daughter, Ella Hepworth Dixon, became a writer, editor and novelist of repute.^[5]

Dixon was a fellow of the

Dixon was criticised for inaccuracy as an author.[1] However, he published in the Daily News a series of startling papers on The Literature of the Lower Orders, which may have suggested Henry Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor. Another series, descriptive of the London Prisons, led to his work, John Howard and the Prison World of Europe, which appeared in 1849, and though declined by many publishers then passed through three editions.^[1]

Thomas Babington Macaulay never took note of these criticisms.^[1]

In 1852 Dixon published a life of Robert Blake, Admiral and General at Sea, based on Family and State Papers. In 1854 he began research on Francis Bacon. He had leave through Lord Stanley and Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton to inspect the "State Papers", until then guarded from general view by successive secretaries of state. He published four articles criticising John Campbell's Life of Bacon in the Athenæum for January 1860. These were expanded and republished as The Personal History of Lord Bacon from Unpublished Papers in 1861. He published separately as a pamphlet in 1861 A Statement of the Facts in regard to Lord Bacon's Confession, and a more elaborate volume called The Story of Lord Bacon's Life, 1862. Dixon's books on Bacon have not been valued by scholars.^[1]

Some of Dixon's Athenæum papers led to publication of the Auckland Memoirs and of Court and Society, edited by the Duke of Manchester. To the latter he contributed a memoir of Queen Catherine.^[1]

In 1869 Dixon brought out the first two volumes of Her Majesty's Tower, which he completed two years later third and fourth volumes. While in Spain Dixon wrote most of his History of Two Queens, i.e. Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn. This expanded into four volumes, the first half, published in 1873, containing the life of Catherine of Aragon, and the second half in 1874 that of Anne Boleyn. In 1878 appeared the first two volumes of his four-volume Royal Windsor.^[1]

Religion

Dixon's Spiritual Wives (1868), treating partly on

Pall Mall Gazette, which had made the charge in a review of Free Russia. He was awarded a derogatory farthing in damages on 29 November 1872.^[1]

Travel

In 1865 Dixon published The Holy Land, a picturesque handbook to Palestine. In 1867 he published his New America, which went through eight editions in England, three in America, and several in France, Russia, Holland, Italy, and Germany. In 1872 came The Switzers. In March 1875 he wrote on North America in The White Conquest. Other books of travel were Free Russia (1870), and British Cyprus (1879).[1]

Novels

In 1877 Dixon published his first romance, in 3 volumes: Diana, Lady Lyle. Another three-volume work of fiction followed in 1878: Ruby Grey.^[1]

Other works

During a panic in 1851 Dixon brought out an anonymous pamphlet, The French in England, or Both Sides of the Question on Both Sides of the Channel, arguing against the possibility of a French invasion. In 1861 he edited the Memoirs of

Gentleman's Magazine "The Way to Egypt" and two other papers recommending the government to purchase its Egyptian suzerainty from the Ottoman Empire.^[1]

, In the same year 1876 he wrote a series of 5 articles about how and why Jew can and should recover Palestine, the articles are:

1- "!- Holy land and City"

2- "II - The Temple"

3- "III - Underground Jerusalem"

4- " Foundations of Zion"

5- " Scenarios of the Baptism"

In 1872 under the pseudonym Onslow Yorke he published an exposé of the

Bolshevik

Revolution it was republished by the British far right in 1921.

Family life

Dixon's daughter,

Ella Nora Hepworth Dixon

, best known as Margaret Wynman, was a novelist and journalist.

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u} "Dixon, William Hepworth" . Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.
2. ^ Retrieved 29 January 2020.
3. ^ With them was found the original of the Marquis of Clanricarde's Memoirs of 23 October 1641–30 August 1643, which were supposed to have been destroyed. They gained a mention in Hardy's Report on the Carte and Carew Papers.
4. ISBN 978-1-136-22542-0
   .
5. ^ ODNB entry for Ella Hepworth Dixon, by Nicola Beauman: Retrieved 25 July 2013. Pay-walled.

Attribution

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: "Dixon, William Hepworth". Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.

External links

Wikisource has original works by or about:
William Hepworth Dixon

• Works by William Hepworth Dixon at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about William Hepworth Dixon at Internet Archive
• William Penn: an historical biography William Hepworth Dixon, 1851, (Blanchard & Lea, London)
• Anonymous (1873). Cartoon portraits and biographical sketches of men of the day. Illustrated by Frederick Waddy. London: Tinsley Brothers. pp. 34–35. Retrieved 6 January 2011.