Page:Dictionary of National Biography, Second Supplement, volume 3.djvu/132

 [q. v. Suppl. I] he assisted in preparing 'Phantasms of the Living' (1886), an encyclopædic collection of tested evidence. In 'Modern Spiritualism' (1902) and 'The Newer Spiritualism' (posthumously issued, 1910) he critically studied the history of spiritualist manifestations from the seventeenth century onwards, and incidentally contested Myers' doctrine of the subliminal self in relation to human personality and its survival after death.

Podmore was one of the founders and members of the first executive committee of the Fabian Society, the title of which he apparently originated (4 Jan. 1884). He helped to prepare an early, and now rare, report on government organisation of unemployed labour, to which Sidney Webb also contributed. His rooms at 14 Dean's Yard, Westminster, were frequently the place of meeting. He wrote none of the 'Fabian Tracts,' and his interest in 'social reconstruction' bore its chief fruit in his full biography of Robert Owen the socialist and spiritualist in 1906.

In 1907 Podmore left London for Broughton near Kettering, a parish of which his brother, Claude Podmore, was rector. He died by drowning in the New Pool, Malvern, where he was making a short stay, on 14 Aug. 1910. The jury returned a verdict of 'found drowned.' He was buried at Malvern Wells cemetery.

Podmore married on 11 June 1891 Eleanore, daughter of Dr. Bramwell of Perth, and sister of Dr. Milne Bramwell, a well-known investigator of the therapeutic aspect of hypnotism. In his later years Podmore lived apart from his wife; there was no issue. A civil list pension of 60l. was granted his widow in 1912.

Podmore combined a good literary style with scientific method. Apart from the works cited he published:
 * 1) 'Apparitions and Thought Transference,' 1894.
 * 2) 'Studies in Psychical Research,' 1897.
 * 3) 'Spiritualism (with Edw. Wake Cook, in 'Pro and Con' series, vol. 2), 1903.
 * 4) 'The Naturalisation of the Supernatural,' 1908.
 * 5) ' Mesmerism and Christian Science,' 1909.
 * 6) 'Telepathic Hallucinations: the New View of Ghosts,' 1910.

His contributions to the 'Proceedings' of the Society for Psychical Research are very numerous, and he wrote articles on his special themes in the 'Encyclopædia Britannica' (11th edit.).



POLLEN, JOHN HUNGERFORD (1820–1902), artist and author, born at 6 New Burlington Street, London, W., on 19 Nov. 1820, was second son (in a family of three sons and three daughters) of Richard Pollen (1786-1838) of Rodbourne, Wiltshire, by his wife Anne, sister of [q. v.], the architect. Sir John Walter Pollen (1784-1863), second baronet of Redenham, Hampshire, was his uncle. Educated at Durham House, Chelsea (1829-33), and at Eton (1833-8) under Edward Coleridge, Pollen matriculated at Christ Church, Oxford, in 1838; he graduated B.A. in 1842, and proceeded M.A. in 1844; he was fellow of Merton College (1842-52), and dean and bursar in 1844, and served as senior proctor of the university (1851-2).

Pollen fell early under the influence of the Oxford Movement, and read much patristic literature. Taking holy orders, he became curate of St. Peter-le-Bailey, Oxford; but the Tractarian upheaval of 1845 weakened Pollen's attachment to the Church of England, and he resigned his curacy in 1846. With [q. v. Suppl. II] he visited Paris in 1847, and studied the organisation of the French church. On his return he associated himself with Pusey, [q. v.], and the leading ritualists, and became pro-vicar at St. Saviour's, Leeds, the church which Pusey had founded in 1842. During his stay there (1847-52) most of his colleagues seceded to Rome. In December 1852 he was inhibited by [q. v.], then bishop of Ripon, for his extreme sacramental views, and on 20 Oct. 1852 he was himself received into the Roman catholic church at Rouen. His elder brother Richard (afterwards third baronet) followed his example next year (see 's Narrative of Five Years at St. Saviour's, Leeds, Oxford, 1851, and his Letter to the Parishioners of St. Saviour's, Leeds, Oxford, 1851). Visits to Rome at the end of 1852 and 1853 led to friendship with (Cardinal) [q. v. Suppl. II] and with W. M. Thackeray.

Pollen, who remained a layman, thenceforth devoted himself professionally to art and architecture. He had already studied the subjects at home and on his foreign travel, and practised them as an amateur,