Page:Dictionary of National Biography, Second Supplement, volume 1.djvu/183

 on 2 Jan. 1867, at Kersal Moor, Manchester, Millicent, daughter of William Sale, a Manchester solicitor, and had issue three sons and a daughter.

Besides the works already noticed, Bigg's chief publications were:
 * 1) 'Neoplatonism,' 1895, in the popular series of 'Ancient Philosophies.'
 * 2) 'The Doctrine of the Twelve Apostles ' (Early Church Classics), 1898.
 * 3) 'Wayside Sketches in Ecclesiastical History,' 1906, nine lectures on Latin writers of the fourth and fifth centuries.
 * 4) 'The Spirit of Christ in Common Life,' 1909, a collection of addresses and sermons.
 * 5) 'The Origins of Christianity,' 1909, a summary of the history and thought of the church in the first three centuries.



BIRCH, GEORGE HENRY (1842–1904), architect and archaeologist, fourth son of Charles Birch by his wife Emma Eliza Cope, was born at Canonbury on 2 Jan. 1842, and educated at Darnell's private school, Islington. At the age of sixteen he was articled to Charles Gray, architect, and was afterwards (about 1859-60) with an architect in Worcester, and then with Sir M. Digby Wyatt and Mr. Ewan Christian. For a tune in active practice as an architect (in Chancery Lane and in Devereux Court, Temple), he designed amongst other works the interior of Acton Reynald Hall, Shrewsbury, for Sir Walter Corbet, baronet, and in 1884 the scheme of redecoration for the church of St. Nicholas Cole Abbey, London. For several years he devoted much of his leisure to the re-arrangement of J. E. Gardner's well-known collection illustrating the topographical history of London (now the property of Major Coates). In 1884 he designed for the Health Exhibition at South Kensington the picturesque and accurate Old London street, the first attempt ever made to reproduce old London on such a scale. His original water-colour drawing of the street was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1886. The street itself, with its church tower, gates, wall, &c., cost nearly 14,000l., and contained shops of the Elizabethan period fitted up at the expense of the City Livery Companies (, Mod. Hist. of the City of London, p. 367). It formed a highly popular exhibit, and was afterwards shown in America.

Elected an associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects in 1875, Birch served as vice-president of the Architectural Association from 1871 to 1873, and as president in 1874-5; was hon. secretary of the London and Middlesex Archæological Society from 1877 to 1883, and Cantor lecturer to the Society of Arts in 1883. He became F.S.A. in 1885, and in 1894 was appointed curator of Sir John Soane's Museum. For many years he took a leading part in the affairs of the St. Paul's Ecclesiological Society, many papers by him being printed in its 'Transactions.' He was one of the original members of the Architectural Company, formed in 1869, of the Artists' Volunteer Corps. Birch is best known as an author by his 'London Churches of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,' a splendid folio published in 1896. He also published: 1. 'Illustrations of an Old House in Lime Street' (with R. Phenè Spiers), folio, 1875. 2. 'London on Thames in bygone Days,' 1903.

Birch died unmarried on 10 May 1904, at Soane's Museum, and was buried in Islington cemetery, Finchley.



BIRD, HENRY EDWARD (1830–1908), chess player, born at Portsea, Hampshire, on 14 July 1830, was son of Henry Bird, of a Somerset family, by his wife Mary. His father afterwards kept a shop in south London. Bird's schooling was scanty, but he educated himself and as a boy developed notable powers of memory. In 1846 he became clerk to an accountant in London, and was afterwards partner in the firm of Coleman, Turquand, Young & Co. During the financial crises of 1847, 1857, and 1867 Bird was greatly occupied in professional business, and between 1860 and 1870 he paid four visits to Canada and America. To railway finance and management he devoted his special attention, giving evidence before the parliamentary committee on amalgamations of home railways in 1868 and framing the statistical tables which still govern the Great Eastern railway. He wrote pamphlets on railway accounts, a comprehensive 'Analysis of Railways in the United Kingdom' (1868 fol.) and 'A Caution to Investors' (1873). But Bird's serious interest through life lay in chess. He learned the moves by watching the games at Raymond's coffee house near the City Road Gate in 1844, moved