Richard Lovell Edgeworth


Richard Lovell Edgeworth was an Anglo-Irish politician, writer and inventor.

Biography

Edgeworth was born in Pierrepont Street, Bath, England, son of Richard Edgeworth senior, and great-grandson of Sir Salathiel Lovell through his mother, Jane Lovell, granddaughter of Sir Salathiel. The Edgeworth family came to Ireland in the 1580s. Richard was descended from Francis Edgeworth, Clerk of the Crown and Hanaper, who inherited a fortune from his brother Edward Edgeworth, Bishop of Down and Connor.
A Trinity College, Dublin and Corpus Christi, Oxford alumnus, he is credited for creating, among other inventions, a machine to measure the size of a plot of land. He also made strides in the developing educational methods. He anticipated the caterpillar track with an invention that he played around with for forty years but that he never successfully developed. He described it as a "cart that carries its own road".
He was married four times, including both Honora Sneyd and Frances Beaufort, older sister of Francis Beaufort of the Royal Navy. The two men installed a semaphore line for Ireland. Richard Lovell Edgeworth was a member of the Lunar Society of Birmingham. The Lunar Society evolved through various degrees of organization over a period of years, but was only ever an informal group. No constitution, minutes, publications or membership lists survive from any period, and evidence of its existence and activities is found only in the correspondence and notes of those associated with it. Dates given for the society range from sometime before 1760 to it still operating as late as 1813. Fourteen individuals have been identified as having verifiably attended Lunar Society meetings regularly over a long period during its most productive time: these are Matthew Boulton, Erasmus Darwin, Thomas Day, Richard Lovell Edgeworth, Samuel Galton, Jr., James Keir, Joseph Priestley, William Small, Jonathan Stokes, James Watt, Josiah Wedgwood, John Whitehurst and William Withering.
Richard Edgeworth and his family lived in Ireland at his estate at Edgeworthstown, County Longford, where he reclaimed bogs and improved roads. He sat in Grattan's Parliament for St Johnstown from 1798 until the Act of Union in 1801, and advocated Catholic Emancipation and parliamentary reform. He was a founder-member of the Royal Irish Academy. He died in Edgworthstown on 13 June 1817.

Family

He was the father of 22 children by his four wives
  1. Anna Maria Elers, of whom four children
  2. : Richard Edgeworth, m. Elizabeth Knight 1788. Died in America
  3. : Lovell Edgeworth
  4. : Maria Edgeworth the novelist
  5. : Emmeline Edgeworth, married Dr. John King of Bristol, October 1802
  6. : Anna Maria Edgeworth, married Dr. Thomas Beddoes 1794.
  7. Honora Sneyd, of whom two children
  8. : Honora Edgeworth
  9. : Lovell Edgeworth, who inherited the property
  10. Elizabeth Sneyd, sister of Honora Sneyd, of whom five sons and four daughters
  11. : Elizabeth Edgeworth
  12. : Henry Edgeworth
  13. : Charlotte Edgeworth
  14. : Sophia Edgeworth
  15. : Charles Sneyd Edgeworth m. Henrica Broadhurst 1813, succeeded his brother Lovell Edgeworth
  16. : William Edgeworth
  17. : Thomas Day Edgeworth
  18. : Honora Edgeworth, married Francis Beaufort 1838
  19. : William Edgeworth, engineer.
  20. Frances Ann Beaufort, botanical artist, daughter of Daniel Augustus Beaufort and Mary Waller, of whom six children,
  21. : Frances Maria Edgeworth m. Lestock Wilson 1829
  22. : Harriet Edgeworth m. Richard Butler 1826
  23. : Sophia Edgeworth m. Barry Fox 1824
  24. : Lucy Jane, married the Irish astronomer Thomas Romney Robinson 1843.
  25. : Francis Beaufort Edgeworth, Mentioned in Thomas Carlyle's Life of Sterling. Married Rosa Florentina Eroles of Spain, 1831, of whom six sons and one daughter
  26. :: William Edgeworth
  27. :: William Edgeworth, entered the army in 1853 and served in India
  28. :: Antonio Eroles Edgeworth, succeeded his uncle Charles Sneyd Edgeworth
  29. :: David Reid Edgeworth
  30. :: Mary Edgeworth
  31. :: Richard Lestock Edgeworth
  32. :: Francis Ysidro Edgeworth, became an influential economist.
  33. : Michael Pakenham Edgeworth, m. Christina Macpherson 1846, botanist.