Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 01.djvu/390

Anderson memory. Francis Bacon, writing at the time of his death, speaks of him as ‘the late great judge’ ( Life of Bacon, iii. 257). Anderson married Magdalen, daughter of Christopher Smyth, of Annables, in Hertfordshire, by whom he had nine children, and from him in the male line are descended the Earls of Yarborough. He amassed a considerable fortune by his practice at the bar, according to Lloyd, and multiplied many times the thousand pounds that he inherited from his father; he lived in some splendour first at Flixborough, probably his native village, then at Asbury in Warwickshire, and afterwards at Harefield Place in Middlesex, and at Eyworth in Bedfordshire. Foss states that Anderson entertained the queen at Harefield, and was presented by her with a diamond ring, but, according to Nichols, Anderson had sold Harefield Place to Sir Thomas Egerton, the lord keeper, in 1601, and by him Elizabeth was entertained on her only recorded visit to the house, in July 1602 (Progresses of Queen Elizabeth, iii. 581). Although Anderson's judicial career of twenty-three years' duration was not rewarded by a peerage, Elizabeth ordered him to preside over the House of Lords during an illness of the lord chancellor in 1587 (Lords' Journal ii. 1276).

Besides Anderson's law reports, published after his death, he drew up several expositions of statutes enacted in Elizabeth's reign which remain in manuscript at the British Museum (Lansd. MSS. 37 fol. 21, 38 fol. 6). Goldesborough's 'Reports,' published in 1653, have often been attributed to Anderson, but they are merely records of his judgments in the chief cases brought before him, and were collected by the lawyer whose name they bear.

 ANDERSON, GEORGE (fl. 1740), was a mathematician, about whom nothing is known beyond what is contained in eight letters addressed by him to the celebrated mathematician, William Jones (father of Sir W. Jones, the Orientalist), which were printed from the Macclesfield papers in 1841. They give proof of singular ability in treating the most advanced mathematical problems of the time, and by many indications show the writer (contrary to an editorial surmise) to have occupied a respectable position in life. The first three are dated from Twickenham. Aug.—Oct. 1736; the last was written 27 Sept. 1740, at Leyden, where the writer had just entered upon a ‘train of studies and exercises’ at the university. He expressed in 1739 a strong desire to be admitted to the Royal Society, but his name does not appear upon the list of its members.

 ANDERSON, GEORGE (1760–1796), accountant-general to the Board of Control, was born at Weston, Buckinghamshire, in Nov. 1760. His parents were in no way distinguished from the peasant class to which they belonged, and he himself worked as a day labourer until near the close of his seventeenth year. He had, however, been early smitten with a passion for mathematical studies, and in 1777 he sent to the ‘London Magazine’ solutions of some problems which had appeared in its pages. His letter attracted the notice of a gentleman of scientific acquirements from the neighbourhood of Weston, named Bonnycastle, who sought out the writer, and found him threshing in a barn, the walls of which were covered with triangles and parallelograms. The incident caused some local sensation, and it was felt that such uncommon talents should not remain without cultivation. Mr. King, vicar of Whitchurch, accordingly took charge of his education, and, after some preliminary instruction at a grammar school, sent him to Wadham College, Oxford, where he took the degree of M.A. in 1784. His patron destined him for the clerical profession; but after he had taken deacon's orders, he found that his tastes were otherwise directed, and came to London in search of employment in January 1785. Through the influence of Scrope Bernard, M.P., brother-in-law to Mr. King, he shortly obtained a situation under the Board of Control, in which his arithmetical powers were so conspicuous as to secure his advancement to the point of accountant-general. While laboriously engaged in preparing the Indian budget for 1796, he was attacked with illness, and died in a few days, the victim of his assiduity, 30 April 1796. His death was deplored as a public loss by Mr. Dundas, then at the head of the Board of Control, and no Indian budget could, in fact, be produced that year. He married in 1790, but left no children. A pension was obtained for his widow by Mr. Dundas. In character he was amiable and unpretending. He 