Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 05.djvu/237

 continued inspector of artillery up to his death. He became a lieutenant-colonel in 1793, colonel in 1800, major-general in 1803, and colonel commandant of a battalion in 1806. In 1807 he was selected to command the artillery in the expedition against Copenhagen, a service admitted to have been admirably carried out, although it is now generally lamented that some more justifiable means could not have been found by the government of the day for attaining the end sought. For his share in this duty Blomefield received the thanks of parliament and was created a baronet. It is remarked that this was the last occasion on which, in accordance with long-established custom, a claim was lodged by the commander of the British artillery on the church-bells of the captured city. No reply appears to have been given to the application. Blomefield, who married a daughter of Chief-justice Eardley Wilmot, by whom he had one child, attained the rank of general in 1821. He died at his residence on Shooter's Hill on 24 Aug. 1822. His professional journals and other papers were subsequently presented to the Royal Artillery Institution, Woolwich, by his son, the second baronet.

Blomefield was a good mathematician, an excellent chemist, and most laborious in experiments in gunnery. His private character and the result of his labours were thus described by one who knew him intimately: 'There was no display of his merits shown in his manner; all his duties and experiments were silently and unassumingly carried on, with a natural reserve and undeviating courtesy, so that it was only a close observer who could duly appreciate his value. His being generally and greatly esteemed arose as much from his being the perfect gentleman as from the ingenious turn of his mind, for there was no glare or obtrusion seen, but rather a strong desire to improve the service with us little show as possible. . . . The recent sieges of Copenhagen and in the Peninsula, where the mode of battering assumed a rapidity unknown on former occasions, strongly marked the confidence his brother officers had in the weapons placed in their hands, and surprised the enemy, who were known to declare that they could not have nut their own ordnance of the same description to so severe a test. The complete success of these objects of his most serious and careful pursuit will be duly appreciated by those capable of judging of their merits. To such as are not, it may be allowed to suggest that many gallant lives have been saved to their country and their families by the constant and most anxious endeavours he at all times pursued to put safe and perfect machines into the hands of the gallant defenders of his majesty's dominions' (, Hist. R. Art. ii. 159).  BLOMFIELD, CHARLES JAMES (1786–1857), bishop of London, was born on 29 May 1786 at Bury St. Edmunds, where his father, Charles BlomHeld, kept a school. He was educated at the grammar school of Bury and at Trinity College, Cambridge. He took his degree of B.A. in 1808, and was elected fellow of his college after winning very high university honours, being complimented, it is said, by Porson as 'a very pretty scholar.' In 1810 he published an edition of the 'Prometheus Vinctus,' with notes and glossary, which was followed by the 'Septem contra Thebas' (1812); the 'Persæ' (1814); and the 'Choephoræ' (1821); an edition of Callimachus in 1815, and of Euripides in 1821. He edited fragments of Sappho, Alcæus, and Stesichorus in Gaisford's 'Poetæ Minores Græci' (1823). Blomfield also wrote on classical subjects for the 'Edinburgh' and 'Quarterly' reviews, and for the 'Museum Criticum,' a journal established in 1813 by himself and his friend Monk, afterwards bishop of Gloucester. Beyond this he published but little except his 'Manual of Family Prayers' (1824), and sermons. In 1810 Blomfield was ordained, and, after holding preferment in the country, was presented to the valuable London benefice of St. Botolph, Bishonsgate. In 1822 he became archdeacon of Colchester, and in 1824 was appointed to the see of Chester; as bishop of Cnester he did much to raise the scale of clerical qualifications. In 1828 Blomfield was translated to the bishopric of London, the duties of which he performed with immense energy, and, on the whole, with sound common sense and moderation. He had many opportunities for displaying his remarkable powers as a man of business when member of the poor law board and of the ecclesiastical commission (1836). Of the latter body he was the moving spirit; 'the better distribution of ecclesiastical revenues and duties, the prevention or diminution of pluralities and non-residence, and the augmentation of poor benefices and endowment of new ones, being measures of church reform which he had much at heart. In the House of Lords he was always an effective speaker, especially upon ecclesiastical subjects. In 1836 the Bishop of London issued 'Proposals for the creation of a fund to be applied to the building and endowment of additional