Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 15.djvu/157

 and Adam Winterton in the ‘Iron Chest.’ The first of these performances stamped his reputation, the last brought him great discouragement. The ‘Iron Chest’ was a failure; Colman, the author, laid the blame upon Kemble, who played Sir Edward Mortimer. The public, however, hissed Dodd, whose part was long and tedious. Dodd was greatly shocked, and after the close of the season 1795–6 he acted no more. His last appearance was as Kecksey in the ‘Irish Widow’ of Garrick, 13 June 1796. He died in the following September. Of the brilliant company assembled by Garrick Dodd was a conspicuous member. Lamb's praise of Dodd will not be forgotten: ‘What an Aguecheek the stage lost in him! … In expressing slowness of apprehension this actor surpassed all others. You could see the first dawn of an idea stealing slowly over his countenance, climbing up by little and little with a painful process, till it cleared up at last to the fulness of a twilight conception, its highest meridian. He seemed to keep back his intellect as some have the power to retard their pulsation.’ Dodd left at his death a collection of books, largely dramatic, which formed a nine days' sale at Sotheby's, and realised large prices. He also collected the weapons of the North American Indians. Like his predecessor Cibber, he had a weak voice. Mrs. Mathews, who speaks of him as ‘the high red-heeled stage dandy of the old school of comedy,’ says he was ‘a very pompous man’ (Tea Table Talk, ii. 222). Dibdin (History of the Stage, v. 349) says, rather nebulously, ‘his great merit was altogether singularity,’ but credits him with ‘a perfect knowledge of his profession.’ Dodd's connection with Mrs. Bulkeley extended over many years, and ended in a separation and a scandal by which for a time the lady suffered. Boaden's ‘Life of Mrs. Inchbald,’ i. 29, tells a story greatly to the discredit of Dodd, whose behaviour to Mrs. Inchbald appears to have been infamous. Dodd had a son James (d. 1820, see Notes and Queries, 5th ser. vi. 289), who was a clergyman, and was usher of the fifth form at Westminster. Portraits of Dodd as Abel Drugger in ‘The Alchemist,’ as Lord Foppington in the ‘Trip to Scarborough’ (Dighton), and in private dress are in the Mathews collection of pictures in the Garrick Club.

[Authorities cited; Genest's Account of the English Stage; Theatrical Biography; Thespian Dictionary, 1805; Dutton Cook's Hours with the Players, 1881; Isaac Reed's Notitia Dramatica MS.] 

DODD, JAMES SOLAS (1721–1805), surgeon, lecturer, and actor, was born in London in 1721. His maternal grandfather, John Dodd, who had been ‘master in the navy during Queen Anne's wars,’ was in 1719 commander of the St. Quintin, a merchantman trading from London to Barcelona. At Barcelona he became acquainted with a young Spanish officer named Don Jago Mendozo Vasconcellos de Solis, a younger brother of Don Antonio de Solis, author of ‘Historia de la Conquista de Mexico.’ Don Jago having had a duel with the son of the governor of Barcelona, and left him for dead, took shelter in Captain Dodd's ship, and sailed in it for London that very evening. Don Jago put up at Captain Dodd's house ‘whilst his pardon was soliciting from the king of Spain,’ and in 1720 married Miss Rebecca Dodd, daughter of his host. On his marriage Don Jago took the name of Dodd in order to perpetuate to his issue a small estate near Newcastle-upon-Tyne. His only child was baptised James Solis, after his family, but by the error of the parish clerk the name was entered on the register as James Solas, which mode of spelling Dodd afterwards adopted. In 1727 Don Jago died in London, having failed to reconcile his father, Don Gaspard de Solis, to his marriage with a protestant, by which he lost his patrimony and commission. Young Dodd received a good education, it being his mother's wish that he should take orders, but ‘on some family reasons’ he was ultimately put apprentice to John Hills, a surgeon practising in the Minories, London, with whom he continued seven years. In 1745 he entered the navy as surgeon's mate of the Blenheim hospital-ship, and served till the end of the war in the Devonshire, a ship of sixty-six guns, and the St. Albans. He continued for some months after the peace in the St. Albans, it being then stationed at Plymouth as a guardship. He took up his diploma as a member of the Corporation of Surgeons, London, in 1751, and practised in Gough Square, Fleet Street, and afterwards in Suffolk Street, Haymarket. In 1752 he commenced authorship with ‘An Essay towards a Natural History of the Herring,’ 8vo, London, written to promote the industry as advocated by the Society of the Free British Fishery. He was indebted to Dr. Thomas Birch for assistance in his literary projects (cf. his letter to Birch, dated 14 April 1752, in Addit. MS. 4305, f. 2). The next year he took part in the great Canning controversy by publishing ‘A Physical Account of the Case of Elizabeth Canning, with an Enquiry into the probability of her subsisting in the manner therein asserted,’ &c., 8vo, London, 1753, in which he argues strongly for the truth of the girl's