(H. M. V.)
KINGSFORD, WILLIAM(1819-1898), British engineer and Canadian historian, was born in London on the 23rd of December 1819. He first studied architecture, but disliking the confinement of an office enlisted in the 1st Dragoon Guards, obtaining his discharge in Canada in 1841. After serving for a time in the office of the city surveyor of Montreal he made a survey for the Lachine canal (1846-1848), and was employed in the United States in the building of the Hudson River railroad in 1849, and in Panama on the railroad being constructed there in 1851. In 1853 he was surveyor and, afterwards district superintendent for the Grand Trunk railroad, remaining in the employment of that company until 1864. The following year he went to England but returned to Canada in 1867 in the hope of taking part in the construction of the Intercolonial Railway. In this he was unsuccessful, but from 1872 to 1879 he held a government post in charge of the harbours of the Great Lakes and the St Lawrence. He had previously written books on engineering and topographical subjects, and in 1880 he began to study the records of Canadian history at Ottawa. Among other books he publishedCanadian Archaeology(1886) andEarly Bibliography of Ontario(1892). But the great work of his life was aHistory of Canadain 10 volumes (1887-1897), ending with the union of Upper and Lower Canada in 1841. Kingsford died on the 28th of September 1898.
KINGSLEY, CHARLES(1819-1875), English clergyman, poet and novelist, was born on the 12th of June 1819, at Holne vicarage, Dartmoor, Devon. His early years were spent at Barnack in the Fen country and at Clovelly in North Devon. The scenery of both made a great impression on his mind, and was afterwards described with singular vividness in his writings. He was educated at private schools and at King’s College, London, after his father’s promotion to the rectory of St Luke’s, Chelsea. In 1838 he entered Magdalene College, Cambridge, and in 1842 he was ordained to the curacy of Eversley in Hampshire, to the rectory of which he was not long afterwards presented, and this, with short intervals, was his home for the remaining thirty-three years of his life. In 1844 he married Fanny, daughter of Pascoe Grenfell, and in 1848 he published his first volume,The Saint’s Tragedy. In 1859 he became chaplain to Queen Victoria; in 1860 he was appointed to the professorship of modern history at Cambridge, which he resigned in 1869; and soon after he was appointed to a canonry at Chester. In 1873 this was exchanged for a canonry at Westminster. He died at Eversley on the 23rd of January 1875.
With the exception of occasional changes of residence in England, generally for the sake of his wife’s health, one or two short holiday trips abroad, a tour in the West Indies, and another in America to visit his eldest son settled there as an engineer, his life was spent in the peaceful, if active, occupations of a clergyman who did his duty earnestly, and of a vigorous and prolific writer. But in spite of this apparently uneventful life, he was for many years one of the most prominent men of his time, and by his personality and his books he exercised considerable influence on the thought of his generation. Though not profoundly learned, he was a man of wide and various information, whose interests and sympathies embraced many branches of human knowledge. He was an enthusiastic student in particular of natural history and geology. Sprung on the father’s side from an old English race of country squires, and on his mother’s side from a good West Indian family who had been slaveholders for generations, he had a keen love of sport and a genuine sympathy with country-folk, but he had at the same time something of the scorn for lower races to be found in the members of a dominant race.
With the sympathetic organization which made him keenly sensible of the wants of the poor, he threw himself heartily into the movement known as Christian Socialism, of which Frederick Denison Maurice was the recognized leader, and for many years he was considered as an extreme radical in a profession the traditions of which were conservative. While in this phase he wrote his novelsYeastandAlton Locke, in which, though he pointed out unsparingly the folly of extremes, he certainly sympathized not only with the poor, but with much that was done and said by the leaders in the Chartist movement. Yet even then he considered that the true leaders of the people were a peer and a dean, and there was no real inconsistency in the fact that at a later period he was among the most strenuous defenders of Governor Eyre in the measures adopted by him to put down the Jamaican disturbances. He looked rather to the extension of the co-operative principle and to sanitary reform for the amelioration of the condition of the people than to any radical political change. His politics might therefore have been described as Toryism tempered by sympathy, or as Radicalism tempered by hereditary scorn of subject races. He was bitterly opposed to what he considered to be the medievalism and narrowness of the Oxford Tractarian Movement. InMacmillan’s Magazinefor January 1864 he asserted that truth for its own sake was not obligatory with the Roman Catholic clergy, quoting as his authority John Henry Newman (q.v.). In the ensuing controversy Kingsley was completely discomfited. He was a broad churchman, who held what would be called a liberal theology, but the Church, its organization, its creed, its dogma, had ever an increasing hold upon him. Although at oneperiod he certainly shrank from reciting the Athanasian Creed in church, he was towards the close of his life found ready to join an association for the defence of this formulary. The more orthodox and conservative elements in his character gained the upper hand as time went on, but careful students of him and his writings will find a deep conservatism underlying the most radical utterances of his earlier years, while a passionate sympathy for the poor, the afflicted and the weak held possession of him till the last hour of his life.
Both as a writer and in his personal intercourse with men, Kingsley was a thoroughly stimulating teacher. As with his own teacher, Maurice, his influence on other men rather consisted in inducing them to think for themselves than in leading them to adopt his own views, never, perhaps, very definite. But his healthy and stimulating influence was largely due to the fact that he interpreted the thoughts which were stirring in the minds of many of his contemporaries.
As a preacher he was vivid, eager and earnest, equally plain-spoken and uncompromising when preaching to a fashionable congregation or to his own village poor. One of the very best of his writings is a sermon calledThe Message of the Church to Working Men; and the best of his published discourses are theTwenty-five Village Sermonswhich he preached in the early years of his Eversley life.
As a novelist his chief power lay in his descriptive faculties. The descriptions of South American scenery inWestward Ho!, of the Egyptian desert inHypatia, of the North Devon scenery inTwo Years Ago, are among the most brilliant pieces of word-painting in English prose-writing; and the American scenery is even more vividly and more truthfully described when he had seen it only by the eye of his imagination than in his workAt Last, which was written after he had visited the tropics. His sympathy for children taught him how to secure their interests. His version of the old Greek stories entitledThe Heroes, andWater-babiesandMadam How and Lady Why, in which he deals with popular natural history, take high rank among books for children.
As a poet he wrote but little, but there are passages inThe Saint’s Tragedyand many isolated lyrics, which are worthy of a place in all standard collections of English literature.Andromedais a very successful attempt at naturalizing the hexameter as a form of English verse, and reproduces with great skill the sonorous roll of the Greek original.
In person Charles Kingsley was tall and spare, sinewy rather than powerful, and of a restless excitable temperament. His complexion was swarthy, his hair dark, and his eye bright and piercing. His temper was hot, kept under rigid control; his disposition tender, gentle and loving, with flashing scorn and indignation against all that was ignoble and impure; he was a good husband, father and friend. One of his daughters, Mary St Leger Kingsley (Mrs Harrison), has become well known as a novelist under the pseudonym of “Lucas Malet.â€
Kingsley’s life was written by his widow in 1877, entitledCharles Kingsley, his Letters and Memories of his Life, and presents a very touching and beautiful picture of her husband, but perhaps hardly does justice to his humour, his wit, his overflowing vitality and boyish fun.The following is a list of Kingsley’s writings:—Saint’s Tragedy, a drama (1848);Alton Locke, a novel (1849);Yeast, a novel (1849);Twenty-five Village Sermons(1849);Phaeton, or Loose Thoughts for Loose Thinkers(1852);Sermons on National Subjects(1st series, 1852);Hypatia, a novel (1853);Glaucus, or the Wonders of the Shore(1855);Sermons on National Subjects(2nd series, 1854);Alexandria and her Schools(1854);Westward Ho!a novel (1855);Sermons for the Times(1855);The Heroes, Greek fairy tales (1856);Two Years Ago, a novel (1857);Andromeda and other Poems(1858);The Good News of God, sermons (1859);Miscellanies(1859);Limits of Exact Science applied to History(Inaugural Lectures, 1860);Town and Country Sermons(1861);Sermons on the Pentateuch(1863);Water-babies(1863);The Roman and the Teuton(1864);David and other Sermons(1866);Hereward the Wake, a novel (1866);The Ancient Regime(Lectures at the Royal Institution, 1867);Water of Life and other Sermons(1867);The Hermits(1869);Madam How and Lady Why(1869);At last(1871);Town Geology(1872);Discipline and other Sermons(1872);Prose Idylls(1873);Plays and Puritans(1873);Health and Education(1874);Westminster Sermons(1874);Lectures delivered in America(1875). He was a large contributor to periodical literature; many of his essays are included inProse Idyllsand other works in the above list. But no collection has been made of some of his more characteristic writings in theChristian SocialistandPolitics for the People, many of them signed by the pseudonym he then assumed, “Parson Lot.â€
Kingsley’s life was written by his widow in 1877, entitledCharles Kingsley, his Letters and Memories of his Life, and presents a very touching and beautiful picture of her husband, but perhaps hardly does justice to his humour, his wit, his overflowing vitality and boyish fun.
The following is a list of Kingsley’s writings:—Saint’s Tragedy, a drama (1848);Alton Locke, a novel (1849);Yeast, a novel (1849);Twenty-five Village Sermons(1849);Phaeton, or Loose Thoughts for Loose Thinkers(1852);Sermons on National Subjects(1st series, 1852);Hypatia, a novel (1853);Glaucus, or the Wonders of the Shore(1855);Sermons on National Subjects(2nd series, 1854);Alexandria and her Schools(1854);Westward Ho!a novel (1855);Sermons for the Times(1855);The Heroes, Greek fairy tales (1856);Two Years Ago, a novel (1857);Andromeda and other Poems(1858);The Good News of God, sermons (1859);Miscellanies(1859);Limits of Exact Science applied to History(Inaugural Lectures, 1860);Town and Country Sermons(1861);Sermons on the Pentateuch(1863);Water-babies(1863);The Roman and the Teuton(1864);David and other Sermons(1866);Hereward the Wake, a novel (1866);The Ancient Regime(Lectures at the Royal Institution, 1867);Water of Life and other Sermons(1867);The Hermits(1869);Madam How and Lady Why(1869);At last(1871);Town Geology(1872);Discipline and other Sermons(1872);Prose Idylls(1873);Plays and Puritans(1873);Health and Education(1874);Westminster Sermons(1874);Lectures delivered in America(1875). He was a large contributor to periodical literature; many of his essays are included inProse Idyllsand other works in the above list. But no collection has been made of some of his more characteristic writings in theChristian SocialistandPolitics for the People, many of them signed by the pseudonym he then assumed, “Parson Lot.â€
KINGSLEY, HENRY(1830-1876), English novelist, younger brother of Charles Kingsley, was born at Barnack, Northamptonshire, on the 2nd of January 1830. In 1853 he left Oxford, where he was an undergraduate at Worcester College, for the Australian goldfields. This venture, however, was not a success, and after five years he returned to England. He achieved considerable popularity with hisRecollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn(1859), a novel of Australian life. This was the first of a series of novels of whichRavenshoe(1861) andThe Hillyars and The Burtons(1865) are the best known. These stories are characterized by much vigour, abundance of incident, and healthy sentiment. He edited for eighteen months theEdinburgh Daily Review, for which he had acted as war correspondent during the Franco-German War. He died at Cuckfield, Sussex, on the 24th of May 1876.
KINGSLEY, MARY HENRIETTA(1862-1900), English traveller, ethnologist and author, daughter of George Henry Kingsley (1827-1892), was born in Islington, London, on the 13th of October 1862. Her father, though less widely known than his brothers, Charles and Henry (see above), was a man of versatile abilities, with a passion for travelling which he managed to indulge in combination with his practice as a doctor. He wrote one popular book of travel,South Sea Bubbles, by the Earl and the Doctor(1872), in collaboration with the 13th earl of Pembroke. Mary Kingsley’s reading in history, poetry and philosophy was wide if desultory, but she was most attracted to natural history. Her family moved to Cambridge in 1886, where she studied the science of sociology. The loss of both parents in 1892 left her free to pursue her own course, and she resolved to study native religion and law in West Africa with a view to completing a book which her father had left unfinished. With her study of “raw fetish†she combined that of a scientific collector of fresh-water fishes. She started for the West Coast in August 1893; and at Kabinda, at Old Calabar, Fernando Po and on the Lower Congo she pursued her investigations, returning to England in June 1894. She gained sufficient knowledge of the native customs to contribute an introduction to Mr R. E. Dennett’sNotes on the Folk Lore of the Fjort(1898). Miss Kingsley made careful preparations for a second visit to the same coast; and in December 1894, provided by the British Museum authorities with a collector’s equipment, she proceeded via Old Calabar to French Congo, and ascended the Ogowé River. From this point her journey, in part across country hitherto untrodden by Europeans, was a long series of adventures and hairbreadth escapes, at one time from the dangers of land and water, at another from the cannibal Fang. Returning to the coast Miss Kingsley went to Corisco and to the German colony of Cameroon, where she made the ascent of the Great Cameroon (13,760 ft.) from a direction until then unattempted. She returned to England in October 1895. The story of her adventures and her investigations in fetish is vividly told in herTravels in West Africa(1897). The book aroused wide interest, and she lectured to scientific gatherings on the fauna, flora and folk-lore of West Africa, and to commercial audiences on the trade of that region and its possible developments, always with a protest against the lack of detailed knowledge characteristic of modern dealings with new fields of trade. In both cases she spoke with authority, for she had brought back a considerable number of new specimens of fishes and plants, and had herself traded in rubber and oil in the districts through which she passed. But her chief concern was for the development of the negro on African, not European, lines and for the government of the British possessions on the West Coast by methods which left the native “a free unsmashed man—not a whitewashed slave or an enemy.†With undaunted energy Miss Kingsley made preparations for a third journey to the West Coast, but the Anglo-Boer War changed her plans, and shedecided to go first to South Africa to nurse fever cases. She died of enteric fever at Simon’s Town, where she was engaged in tending Boer prisoners, on the 3rd of June 1900. Miss Kingsley’s works, besides herTravels, includeWest African Studies, The Story of West Africa, a memoir of her father prefixed to hisNotes on Sport and Travel(1899), and many contributions to the study of West African law and folk-lore. To continue the investigation of the subjects Miss Kingsley had made her own “The African Society†was founded in 1901.
Valuable biographical information from the pen of Mr George A. Macmillan is prefixed to a second edition (1901) of theStudies.
Valuable biographical information from the pen of Mr George A. Macmillan is prefixed to a second edition (1901) of theStudies.
KING’S LYNN(LynnorLynn Regis), a market town, seaport and municipal and parliamentary borough of Norfolk, England, on the estuary of the Great Ouse near its outflow into the Wash. Pop. (1901), 20,288. It is 97 m. N. by E. from London by the Great Eastern railway, and is also served by the Midland and Great Northern joint line. On the land side the town was formerly defended by a fosse, and there are still considerable remains of the old wall, including the handsome South Gate of the 15th century. Several by-channels of the river, passing through the town, are known as fleets, recalling the similarfletheof Hamburg. The Public Walks forms a pleasant promenade parallel to the wall, and in the centre of it stands a picturesque octagonal Chapel of the Red Mount, exhibiting ornate Perpendicular work, and once frequented by pilgrims. The church of St Margaret, formerly the priory church, is a fine building with two towers at the west end, one of which was formerly surmounted by a spire, blown down in 1741. Norman or transitional work appears in the base of both towers, of which the southern also shows Early English and Decorated work, while the northern is chiefly Perpendicular. There is a fine Perpendicular east window of circular form. The church possesses two of the finest monumental brasses in existence, dated respectively 1349 and 1364. St Nicholas chapel, at the north end of the town, is also of rich Perpendicular workmanship, with a tower of earlier date. All Saints’ church in South Lynn is a beautiful Decorated cruciform structure. Of a Franciscan friary there remains the Perpendicular Grey Friars’ Steeple, and the doorway remains of a priests’ college founded in 1502. At the grammar school, founded in the reign of Henry VIII., but occupying modern buildings, Eugene Aram was usher. Among the other public buildings are the guildhall, with Renaissance front, the corn exchange, the picturesque custom-house of the 17th century, the athenaeum (including a museum, hall and other departments), the Stanley Library and the municipal buildings. The fisheries of the town are important, including extensive mussel-fisheries under the jurisdiction of the corporation, and there are also breweries, corn-mills, iron and brass foundries, agricultural implement manufactories, ship-building yards, rope and sail works. Lynn Harbour has an area of 30 acres and an average depth at low tide of 10 ft. There is also good anchorage in the roads leading from the Wash to the docks. There are two docks of 6¾ and 10 acres area respectively. A considerable traffic is carried on by barges on the Ouse. The municipal and parliamentary boroughs of Lynn are co-extensive; the parliamentary borough returns one member. The town is governed by a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors. Area, 3061 acres.
As Lynn (Lun, Lenne, Bishop’s Lynn) owes its origin to the trade which its early settlers carried by the Ouse and its tributaries its history dates from the period of settled occupation by the Saxons. It belonged to the bishops of Thetford before the Conquest and remained with the see when it was translated to Norwich. Herbert de Losinga (c.1054-1119) granted its jurisdiction to the cathedral of Norwich but this right was resumed by a later bishop, John de Gray, who in 1204 had obtained from John a charter establishing Lynn as a free borough. A fuller grant in 1206 gave the burgesses a gild merchant, the husting court to be held once a week only, and general liberties according to the customs of Oxford, saving the rights of the bishop and the earl of Arundel, whose ancestor William D’Albini had received from William II. the moiety of the tolbooth. Among numerous later charters one of 1268 confirmed the privilege granted to the burgesses by the bishop of choosing a mayor; another of 1416 re-established his election by the aldermen alone. Henry VIII. granted Lynn two charters, the first (1524) incorporating it under mayor and aldermen; the second (1537) changing its name to King’s Lynn and transferring to the corporation all the rights hitherto enjoyed by the bishop. Edward VI. added the possessions of the gild of the Trinity, or gild merchant, and St George’s gild, while Queen Mary annexed South Lynn. Admiralty rights were granted by James I. Lynn, which had declared for the Crown in 1643, surrendered its privileges to Charles II. in 1684, but recovered its charter on the eve of the Revolution. A fair held on the festival of St Margaret (July 20) was included in the grant to the monks of Norwich about 1100. Three charters of John granting the bishop fairs on the feasts of St Nicholas, St Ursula and St Margaret are extant, and another of Edward I., changing the last to the feast of St Peter ad Vincula (Aug. 1). A local act was passed in 1558-1559 for keeping a mart or fair once a year. In the eighteenth century besides the pleasure fair, still held in February, there was another in October, now abolished. A royal charter of 1524 established the cattle, corn and general provisions market, still held every Tuesday and Saturday. Lynn has ranked high among English seaports from early times.
See E. M. Beloe,Our Borough(1899); H. Harrod,Report on Deeds, &c.;, of King’s Lynn (1874);Victoria County History: Norfolk.
See E. M. Beloe,Our Borough(1899); H. Harrod,Report on Deeds, &c.;, of King’s Lynn (1874);Victoria County History: Norfolk.
KING’S MOUNTAIN,a mountainous ridge in Gaston county, North Carolina and York county, South Carolina, U.S.A. It is an outlier of the Blue Ridge running parallel with it,i.e.N.E. and S.W., but in contrast with the other mountains of the Blue Ridge, King’s Mountain has a crest marked with sharp and irregular notches. Its highest point and great escarpment are in North Carolina. About 1½ m. S. of the line between the two states, where the ridge is about 60 ft. above the surrounding country and very narrow at the top, the battle of King’s Mountain was fought on the 7th of October 1780 between a force of about 100 Provincial Rangers and about 1000 Loyalist militia under Major Patrick Ferguson (1744-1780), and an American force of about 900 backwoodsmen under Colonels William Campbell (1745-1781), Benjamin Cleveland (1738-1806), Isaac Shelby, John Sevier and James Williams (1740-1780), in which the Americans were victorious. The British loss is stated as 119 killed (including the commander), 123 wounded, and 664 prisoners; the American loss was 28 killed (including Colonel Williams) and 62 wounded. The victory largely contributed to the success of General Nathanael Greene’s campaign against Lord Cornwallis. There has been some dispute as to the exact site of the engagement, but the weight of evidence is in favour of the position mentioned above, on the South Carolina side of the line. A monument erected in 1815 was replaced in 1880 by a much larger one, and a monument for which Congress appropriated $30,000 in 1906, was completed in 1909.
See L. C. Draper,King’s Mountain and its Heroes(Cincinnati, 1881); and Edward McCrady,South Carolina in the Revolution 1775-1780(New York, 1901).
See L. C. Draper,King’s Mountain and its Heroes(Cincinnati, 1881); and Edward McCrady,South Carolina in the Revolution 1775-1780(New York, 1901).
KINGSTON, ELIZABETH,Duchess of(1720-1788), sometimes called countess of Bristol, was the daughter of Colonel Thomas Chudleigh (d. 1726), and was appointed maid of honour to Augusta, princess of Wales, in 1743, probably through the good offices of her friend, William Pulteney, earl of Bath. Being a very beautiful woman Miss Chudleigh did not lack admirers, among whom were James, 6th duke of Hamilton, and Augustus John Hervey, afterwards 3rd earl of Bristol. Hamilton, however, left England, and on the 4th of August 1744 she was privately married to Hervey at Lainston, near Winchester. Both husband and wife being poor, their union was kept secret to enable Elizabeth to retain her post at court, while Hervey, who was a naval officer, rejoined his ship, returning to England towards the close of 1746. The marriage was a very unhappy one, and the pair soon ceased to live together; but when it appeared probable that Hervey would succeed his brother as earlof Bristol, his wife took steps to obtain proof of her marriage. This did not, however, prevent her from becoming the mistress of Evelyn Pierrepont, 2nd duke of Kingston, and she was not only a very prominent figure in London society, but in 1765 in Berlin she was honoured by the attentions of Frederick the Great. By this time Hervey wished for a divorce from his wife; but Elizabeth, although equally anxious to be free, was unwilling to face the publicity attendant upon this step. However she began a suit of jactitation against Hervey. This case was doubtless collusive, and after Elizabeth had sworn she was unmarried, the court in February 1769 pronounced her a spinster. Within a month she married Kingston, who died four years later, leaving her all his property on condition that she remained a widow. Visiting Rome the duchess was received with honour by Clement XIV.; after which she hurried back to England to defend herself from a charge of bigamy, which had been preferred against her by Kingston’s nephew, Evelyn Meadows (d. 1826). The house of Lords in 1776 found her guilty, and retaining her fortune she hurriedly left England to avoid further proceedings on the part of the Meadows family, who had a reversionary interest in the Kingston estates. She lived for a time in Calais, and then repaired to St Petersburg, near which city she bought an estate which she named “Chudleigh.†Afterwards she resided in Paris, Rome, and elsewhere, and died in Paris on the 26th of August 1788. The duchess was a coarse and licentious woman, and was ridiculed as Kitty Crocodile by the comedian Samuel Foote in a playA Trip to Calais, which, however, he was not allowed to produce. She is said to have been the original of Thackeray’s characters, Beatrice and Baroness Bernstein.
There is an account of the duchess in J. H. Jesse’sMemoirs of the Court of England 1688-1760, vol. iv. (1901).
There is an account of the duchess in J. H. Jesse’sMemoirs of the Court of England 1688-1760, vol. iv. (1901).
KINGSTON, WILLIAM HENRY GILES(1814-1880), English novelist, son of Lucy Henry Kingston, was born in London on the 28th of February 1814. Much of his youth was spent at Oporto, where his father was a merchant, but when he entered the business, he made his headquarters in London. He early wrote newspaper articles on Portuguese subjects. These were translated into Portuguese, and the author received a Portuguese order of knighthood and a pension for his services in the conclusion of the commercial treaty of 1842. In 1844 his first book,The Circassian Chief, appeared, and in 1845The Prime Minister, a Story of the Days of the Great Marquis of Pombal. TheLusitanian Sketchesdescribe Kingston’s travels in Portugal. In 1851Peter the Whaler, his first book for boys, came out. These books proved so popular that Kingston retired from business, and devoted himself to the production of tales of adventure for boys. Within thirty years he wrote upwards of one hundred and thirty such books. He had a practical knowledge of seamanship, and his stories of the sea, full of thrilling adventures and hairbreadth escapes, exactly hit the taste of his boy readers. Characteristic specimens of his work areThe Three Midshipmen;The Three Lieutenants;The Three Commanders; andThe Three Admirals. He also wrote popular accounts of famous travellers by land and sea, and translated some of the stories of Jules Verne.
In all philanthropic schemes Kingston took deep interest; he was the promoter of the mission to seamen; and he acted as secretary of a society for promoting an improved system of emigration. He was editor of theColonistfor a short time in 1844 and of theColonial Magazine and East Indian Reviewfrom 1849 to 1851. He was a supporter of the volunteer movement in England from the first. He died at Willesden on the 5th of August 1880.
KINGSTON,the chief city of Frontenac county, Ontario, Canada, at the north-eastern extremity of Lake Ontario, and the mouth of the Cataraqui River. Pop. (1901), 17,961. It is an important station on the Grand Trunk railway, the terminus of the Kingston & Pembroke railway, and has steamboat communication with other ports on Lake Ontario and the Bay of Quinte, on the St Lawrence and the Rideau canal. It contains a fine stone graving dock, 280 ft. long, 100 ft. wide, and with a depth of 16 ft. at low water on the sill. The fortifications, which at one time made it one of the strongest fortresses in Canada, are now out of date. The sterility of the surrounding country, and the growth of railways have lessened its commercial importance, but it still contains a number of small factories, and important locomotive works and ship-building yards. As an educational and residential centre it retains high rank, and is a popular summer resort. It is the seat of an Anglican and of a Roman Catholic bishopric, of the Royal Military College (founded by the Dominion government in 1875), of an artillery school, and of Queen’s University, an institution founded in 1839 under the nominal control of the Presbyterian church, now including about 1200 students. In the suburbs are a Dominion penitentiary, and a provincial lunatic asylum. Founded by the French in 1673, under the name of Kateracoui, soon changed to Fort Frontenac, it played an important part in the wars between English and French. Taken and destroyed by the English in 1758, it was refounded in 1782 under its present name, and was from 1841 to 1844 the capital of Canada.
KINGSTON,a city and the county-seat of Ulster county, New York, U.S.A., on the Hudson River, at the mouth of Rondout Creek, about 90 m. N. of New York and about 53 m. S. of Albany. Pop. (1900), 24,535—3551 being foreign-born; (1910 census) 25,908. It is served by the West Shore (which here crosses Rondout Creek on a high bridge), the New York Ontario & Western, the Ulster & Delaware, and the Wallkill Valley railways, by a ferry across the river to Rhinecliff, where connexion is made with the New York Central & Hudson River railroad, and by steamboat lines to New York, Albany and other river points. The principal part of the city is built on a level plateau about 150 ft. above the river; other parts of the site vary from flatlands to rough highlands. To the N.W. is the mountain scenery of the Catskills, to the S.W. the Shawangunk Mountains and Lake Mohonk, and in the distance across the river are the Berkshire Hills. The most prominent public buildings are the post office and the city hall; in front of the latter is a Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument. The city has a Carnegie library. The “Senate Houseâ€â€”now the property of the state, with a colonial museum—was erected about 1676; it was the meeting place of the first State Senate in 1777, and was burned (except the walls) in October of that year. The court house (1818) stands on the site of the old court house, in which Governor George Clinton was inaugurated in July 1777, and in which Chief Justice John Jay held the first term of the New York Supreme Court in September 1777. The Elmendorf Tavern (1723) was the meeting-place of the New York Council of Safety in October 1777. Kingston Academy was organized in 1773, and in 1864 was transferred to the Kingston Board of Education and became part of the city’s public school system; its present building dates from 1806. Kingston’s principal manufactures are tobacco, cigars and cigarettes, street railway cars and boats; other manufactures are Rosendale cement, bricks, shirts, lace curtains, brushes, motor wheels, sash and blinds. The city ships large quantities of building and flag stones quarried in the vicinity. The total value of the factory product in 1905 was $5,000,922, an increase of 26.5% since 1900.
In 1614 a small fort was built by the Dutch at the mouth of Rondout Creek, and in 1652 a settlement was established in the vicinity and named Esopus after the Esopus Indians, who were a subdivision of the Munsee branch of the Delawares, and whose name meant “small river,†referring possibly to Rondout Creek. The settlement was deserted in 1655-56 on account of threatened Indian attacks. In 1658 a stockade was built by the order of Governor Peter Stuyvesant, and from this event the actual founding of the city is generally dated. In 1659 the massacre of several drunken Indians by the soldiers caused a general rising of the Indians, who unsuccessfully attacked the stockade, killing some of the soldiers and inhabitants, and capturing and torturing others. Hostilities continued into the following year. In 1661 the governor named the place Wiltwyck and gave it a municipal charter. In 1663 it suffered from another Indian attack, a number of the inhabitants being slain or taken prisoners. The English took possessionin 1664, and in 1660 Wiltwyck was named Kingston, after Kingston Lisle, near Wantage, England, the family seat of Governor Francis Lovelace. In the same year the English garrison was removed. In 1673-1674 Kingston was again temporarily under the control of the Dutch, who called it Swanenburg. In 1777 the convention which drafted the new state constitution met in Kingston, and during part of the year Kingston was the seat of the new state government. On the 16th of October 1777 the British under General Sir John Vaughan (1748-95) sacked it and burned nearly all its buildings. In 1908 the body of George Clinton was removed from Washington, D.C., and reinterred in Kingston on the 250th anniversary of the building of the stockade. In 1787 Kingston was one of the places contemplated as a site for the national capital. In 1805 it was incorporated as a village, and in 1872 it absorbed the villages of Rondout and Wilbur and was made a city.
See M. Schoonmaker,History of Kingston(New York, 1888).
See M. Schoonmaker,History of Kingston(New York, 1888).
KINGSTON,a borough of Luzerne county, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., on the North Branch of the Susquehanna river, opposite Wilkes-Barré. Pop. (1900), 3846 (1039 foreign-born); (1910) 6449. Kingston is served by the Delaware, Lackawanna &. Western and the Lehigh Valley railways. It is the seat of Wyoming Seminary (1844; co-educational), a well-known secondary school. Anthracite coal is mined here; there are railway repair and machine-shops; and among the borough’s manufactures are hosiery, silk goods, underwear and adding machines. Kingston (at first called “Kingstown,†from Kings Towne, Rhode Island) was commonly known in its early days as the “Forty Township,†because the first permanent settlement was made by forty pioneers from Connecticut, who were sent out by the Susquehanna Company and took possession of the district in its name in 1769. In 1772 the famous “Forty Fort,†a stockade fortification, was built here, and in 1777 it was rebuilt, strengthened and enlarged. Here on the 3rd of July 1778 about 400 men and boys met, and under the command of Colonel Zebulon Butler (1731-95) went out to meet a force of about 1100 British troops and Indians, commanded by Major John Butler and Old King (Sayenqueraghte). The Americans were defeated in the engagement that followed, and many of the prisoners taken were massacred or tortured by the Indians. A monument near the site of the fort commemorates the battle and massacre. Kingston was incorporated as a borough in 1857. (SeeWyoming Valley.)
KINGSTON, the capital and chief port of Jamaica, West Indies. Pop. (1901), 46,542, mostly negroes. It is situated in the county of Surrey, in the south-east of the island, standing on the north shore of a land-locked harbour—for its size one of the finest in the world—and with its suburbs occupying an area of 1080 acres. The town contains the principal government offices. It has a good water supply, a telephone service and a supply of both gas and electric light, while electric trams ply between the town and its suburbs. The Institute of Jamaica maintains a public library, museum and art gallery especially devoted to local interests. The old parish church in King Street, dating probably from 1692 was the burial-place of William Hall (1699) and Admiral Benbow (1702). The suburbs are remarkable for their beauty. The climate is dry and healthy, and the temperature ranges from 93° to 66° F. Kingston was founded in 1693, after the neighbouring town of Port Royal had been ruined by an earthquake in 1692. In 1703, Port Royal having been again laid waste by fire, Kingston became the commercial, and in 1872 the political, capital of the island. On several occasions Kingston was almost entirely consumed by fire, the conflagrations of 1780, 1843, 1862 and 1882 being particularly severe. On the 14th of January 1907 it was devastated by a terrible earthquake. A long immunity had led to the erection of many buildings not specially designed to withstand such shocks, and these and the fire which followed were so destructive that practically the whole town had to be rebuilt. (SeeJamaica.)
KINGSTON-ON-THAMES,a market town and municipal borough in the Kingston parliamentary division of Surrey, England, 11 m. S.W. of Charing Cross, London; on the London and South-Western railway. Pop. (1901), 34,375. It has a frontage with public walks and gardens upon the right bank of the Thames, and is in close proximity to Richmond and Bushey Parks, its pleasant situation rendering it a favourite residential district. The ancient wooden bridge over the river, which was in existence as early as 1223, was superseded by a structure of stone in 1827. The parish church of All Saints, chiefly Perpendicular in style, contains several brasses of the 15th century, and monuments by Chantrey and others; the grammar school, rebuilt in 1878, was originally founded as a chantry by Edward Lovekyn in 1305, and converted into a school by Queen Elizabeth. Near the parish church stood the chapel of St Mary, where it is alleged the Saxon kings were crowned. The ancient stone said to have been used as a throne at these coronations was removed to the market-place in 1850. At Norbiton, within the borough, is the Royal Cambridge Asylum for soldiers’ widows (1854). At Kingston Hill is an industrial and training school for girls, opened in 1892. There are large market gardens in the neighbourhood, and the town possesses oil-mills, flour-mills, breweries and brick and tile works. The borough is under a mayor, 8 aldermen and 24 councillors. Area, 1133 acres.
The position of Kingston (Cyningestun,Chingestune) on the Thames where there was probably a ford accounts for its origin; its later prosperity was due to the bridge which existed in 1223 and possibly long before. In 836 or 838 it was the meeting-place of the council under Ecgbert, and in the 10th century some if not all of the West Saxon kings were crowned at Kingston. In the time of Edward the Confessor it was a royal manor, and in 1086 included a church, five mills and three fisheries. Domesday also mentions bedels in Kingston. The original charters were granted by John in 1200 and 1209, by which the free men of Kingston were empowered to hold the town in fee-farm for ever, with all the liberties that it had while in the king’s hands. Henry III. sanctioned the gild-merchant which had existed previously, and granted other privileges. These charters were confirmed and extended by many succeeding monarchs down to Charles I. Henry VI. incorporated the town under two bailiffs. Except for temporary surrenders of their corporate privileges under Charles II. and James II. the government of the borough continued in its original form until 1835, when it was reincorporated under the title of mayor, aldermen and burgesses. Kingston returned two members to parliament in 1311, 1313, 1353 and 1373, but never afterwards. The market, still held on Saturdays, was granted by James I., and the Wednesday market by Charles II. To these a cattle-market on Thursdays has been added by the corporation. The only remaining fair, now held on the 13th of November, was granted by Henry III., and was then held on the morrow of All Souls and seven days following.
KINGSTON-UPON-HULL, EARLS AND DUKES OF.These titles were borne by the family of Pierrepont, or Pierrepoint, from 1628 to 1773.
Robert Pierrepont(1584-1643), second son of Sir Henry Pierrepont of Holme Pierrepont, Nottinghamshire, was member of parliament for Nottingham in 1601, and was created Baron Pierrepont and Viscount Newark in 1627, being made earl of Kingston-upon-Hull in the following year. He remained neutral on the outbreak of the Civil War; but afterwards he joined the king, and was appointed lieutenant-general of the counties of Lincoln, Rutland, Huntingdon, Cambridge and Norfolk. Whilst defending Gainsborough he was taken prisoner, and was accidentally killed on the 25th of July 1643 while being conveyed to Hull. The earl had five sons, one of whom was Francis Pierrepont (d. 1659), a colonel in the parliamentary army and afterwards a member of the Long Parliament; and another was William Pierrepont (q.v.), a leading member of the parliamentary party.
His sonHenry Pierrepont(1606-1680), 2nd earl of Kingston and 1st marquess of Dorchester, was member of parliament for Nottinghamshire, and was called to the House of Lords as Baron Pierrepont in 1641. During the earlier part of the Civil War he was at Oxford in attendance upon the king, whom he represented at the negotiations at Uxbridge. In 1645 he was made a privycouncillor and created marquess of Dorchester; but in 1647 he compounded for his estates by paying a large fine to the parliamentarians. Afterwards the marquess, who was always fond of books, spent his time mainly in London engaged in the study of medicine and law, his devotion to the former science bringing upon him a certain amount of ridicule and abuse. After the Restoration he was restored to the privy council, and was made recorder of Nottingham and a fellow of the Royal Society. Dorchester had two daughters, but no sons, and when he died in London on the 8th of December 1680 the title of marquess of Dorchester became extinct. He was succeeded as 3rd earl of Kingston by Robert (d. 1682), a son of Robert Pierrepont of Thoresby, Nottinghamshire, and as 4th earl by Robert’s brother William (d. 1690).
Evelyn Pierrepont(c.1655-1726), 5th earl and 1st duke of Kingston, another brother had been member of parliament for East Retford before his accession to the peerage. While serving as one of the commissioners for the union with Scotland he was created marquess of Dorchester in 1706, and took a leading part in the business of the House of Lords. He was made a privy councillor and in 1715 was created duke of Kingston; afterwards serving as lord privy seal and lord president of the council. The duke, who died on the 5th of March 1726, was a prominent figure in the fashionable society of his day. He was twice married, and had five daughters, among whom was Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (q.v.), and one son, William, earl of Kingston (d. 1713).
The latter’s son,Evelyn Pierrepont(1711-1773), succeeded his grandfather as second duke of Kingston. When the rebellion of 1745 broke out he raised a regiment called “Kingston’s light horse,†which distinguished itself at Culloden. The duke, who attained the rank of general in the army, is described by Horace Walpole as “a very weak man, of the greatest beauty and finest person in England.†He is chiefly famous for his connexion with Elizabeth Chudleigh, who claimed to be duchess of Kingston (q.v.). The Kingston titles became extinct on the duke’s death without children on the 23rd of September 1773, but on the death of the duchess in 1788 the estates came to his nephew Charles Meadows (1737-1816), who took the name of Pierrepont and was created Baron Pierrepont and Viscount Newark in 1796, and Earl Manvers in 1806. His descendant, the present Earl Manvers, is thus the representative of the dukes of Kingston.
KINGSTOWN,a seaport of Co. Dublin, Ireland, in the south parliamentary division, at the south-eastern extremity of Dublin Bay, 6 m. S.E. from Dublin by the Dublin & South-Eastern railway. Pop. of urban district (1901), 17,377. It is a large seaport and favourite watering-place, and possesses several fine streets, with electric trams, and terraces commanding picturesque sea views. The original name of Kingstown was Dunleary, which was exchanged for the present designation after the embarkation of George IV. at the port on his return from Ireland in 1821, an event which is also commemorated by a granite obelisk erected near the harbour. The town was a mere fishing village until the construction of an extensive harbour, begun in 1817 and finally completed in 1859. The eastern pier has a length of 3500 ft. and the western of 4950 ft., the total area enclosed being about 250 acres, with a varying depth of from 15 to 27 ft. Kingstown is the station of the City of Dublin Steam Packet Company’s mail steamers to Holyhead in connexion with the London & North-Western railway. It has large export and import trade both with Great Britain and foreign countries. The principal export is cattle, and the principal imports corn and provisions. Kingstown is the centre of an extensive sea-fishery; and there are three yacht clubs: the Royal Irish, Royal St George and Royal Alfred.
KING-TÊ CHÊN,a town near Fu-liang Hien, in the province of Kiang-si, China, and the principal seat of the porcelain manufacture in that empire. Being situated on the south bank of the river Chang, it was in ancient times known asChang-nan Chên, or “town on the south of the river Chang.†It is unwalled, and straggles along the bank of the river. The streets are narrow, and crowded with a population which is reckoned at a million, the vast majority of whom find employment at the porcelain factories. Since the Ch’in dynasty (557-589) this has been the great trade of the place, which was then called by its earlier name. In the reign of King-tê (Chên-tsung) of the Sung dynasty, early in the 11th centuryA.D., a manufactory was founded there for making vases and objects of art for the use of the emperor. Hence its adoption of its present title. Since the time of the Ming dynasty a magistrate has been specially appointed to superintend the factories and to despatch at regulated intervals the imperial porcelain to Peking. The town is situated on a vast plain surrounded by mountains, and boasts of three thousand porcelain furnaces. These constantly burning fires are the causes of frequent conflagrations, and at night give the city the appearance of a place on fire. The people are as a rule orderly, though they have on several occasions shown a hostile bearing towards foreign visitors. This is probably to be accounted for by a desire to keep their art as far as possible a mystery, which appears less unreasonable when it is remembered that the two kinds of earth of which the porcelain is made are not found at King-tê Chên, but are brought from K’i-mun in the neighbouring province of Ngan-hui, and that there is therefore no reason why the trade should be necessarily maintained at that place. The two kinds of earth are known as pai-tun-tsze, which is a fine fusible quartz powder, and kaolin, which is not fusible, and is said to give strength to the ware. Both materials are prepared in the shape of bricks at K’i-mun, and are brought down the Chang to the seat of the manufacture.