Sydney Godolphin Osborne
Lord Sydney Godolphin Osborne (5 February 1808 – 9 May 1889) was an English cleric, philanthropist and writer.
Life
The third son of Francis Osborne, 1st Baron Godolphin, by Elizabeth Charlotte Eden, daughter of William Eden, 1st Baron Auckland, he was born at Stapleford, Cambridgeshire on 5 February 1808. He was a direct descendant of Sidney Godolphin, 1st Earl of Godolphin, and when in 1859 his elder brother George Godolphin Osborne, succeeded his cousin Francis Godolphin D'Arcy Osborne, as eighth Duke of Leeds, he obtained the rank of a duke's son, and with it the use of "Lord", a courtesy title.[1]
Osborne was educated at Rugby School and at Brasenose College, Oxford, where he graduated B.A. in 1830. Having taken orders, he was appointed rector of Stoke-Poges in Buckinghamshire in 1832. In 1841 he accepted the living of Durweston in Dorset, which was in the gift of Lord Portman, and he occupied it until 1875.[1]
Osborne then resigned his benefice and retired to Lewes, where he died on 9 May 1889.[1]
Interests
Osborne commented on free trade, education, women's rights, sanitation, cattle plague, and cholera. During the Crimean War, he made an unofficial inspection and aided the improvement of the hospitals under Florence Nightingale's care, and published the results in Scutari and its Hospitals, 1855. With respect to Ireland he was a Unionist, and in church matters an anticlerical. Agricultural labourers were a particular interest.[1][2]
Works
Osborne was mainly known for letter to The Times newspaper signed "S. G. O." He constantly and quite ferociously provoked controversy. The final letters of the series started in 1844, were on the subject of the Whitechapel murders, in 1888. A selection from them was published, with a brief introduction, by Arnold White (2 vols. London, 1888). His other writings included:[1]
- Gleanings in the West of Ireland, 1850. The result of a visit to Ireland during the famine of 1847.[2]
- Lady Eva: her last Days. A Tale, 1851.
- Hints to the Charitable, 1856.
- Hints for the Amelioration of the Moral Condition of a Village, 1856.
- Letters on the Education of Young Children, 1866.
Family
Osborne married in 1834 Emily, daughter of Pascoe Grenfell of Taplow Court, Buckinghamshire; and was therefore brother-in-law to Charles Kingsley and James Anthony Froude. His wife died on 19 December 1875, leaving two sons and two daughters.[1]
Notes
- 1 2 3 4 5 6
Lee, Sidney, ed. (1895). "Osborne, Sidney Godolphin". Dictionary of National Biography 42. London: Smith, Elder & Co. - 1 2 "Osborne, Sydney Godolphin". The American Cyclopædia. 1879.
References
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Lee, Sidney, ed. (1895). "Osborne, Sidney Godolphin". Dictionary of National Biography 42. London: Smith, Elder & Co.