Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 36.djvu/307

Martin 1812, xxxix. 81-5; 'Cursory Remarks on &hellip; Rotten Stone,' in 'Mem. Manchester Philosoph. Soc.' 1813, ii. 31&-27, reprinted in 'Nicholson's Journal,' xxxvi. 46-56.



MARTIN, WILLIAM (fl. 1765–1821), painter, was pupil and assistant to, R.A. [q. v.], and appears to have resided for about twenty years or more in Cipriani's house. In 1766 he was awarded a gold palette for an historical painting by the Society of Arts. In 1775 he exhibited at the Royal Academy a portrait and 'Antiochus and Stratonice,' In the next nine years he contributed portraits, scenes from Shakespeare, or classical subjects. In 1791 he sent 'Lady Macduff surprised in her Castle of Fife,' and in 1797 and 1798 portraits. About 1800 he was engaged on decorative paintings at Windsor Castle, which occupied him some years. He was an exhibitor at the Royal Academy again in 1807, 1810, 1812, and 1816. In 1810 his name appears as 'Historical Painter to His Majesty.' In 1812 he was residing at Cranford in Middlesex, and was still living there in 1821 ; there is, however, no record of his death at that place.

Two of Martin's pictures in St. Andrew's Hall, Norwich, 'The Death of Lady Jane Grey' and 'The Death of Queen Eleanor,' were engraved by F. Bartolozzi, R.A., who also engraved his 'Imogen's Chamber.' A picture of The Barons swearing the Charter of Liberties at Bury St. Edmunds,' now in the University Galleries at Oxford, was engraved in mezzotint by W. Ward. 'A Cottage Interior' was similarly engraved by Turner, and 'The Confidants' by J. Watson.



MARTIN, WILLIAM (1772–1851), ‘natural philosopher and poet,’ born on 21 June 1772, at the Twohouse in Haltwhistle, hard by the Roman Wall, in Northumberland, was eldest son of Fenwick Martin, by his wife Ann, daughter of Richard Thompson. The father, who was successively a tanner, a publican, and a coach-builder, had four sons, the two youngest of whom, Jonathan (1782–1838) and John (1789–1854), are separately noticed; the second son, Richard, was a quartermaster in the guards, who served through the Peninsular war, and was present at Waterloo, and there was one daughter, Ann. William left his native place in 1775 for Cantyre, in company with his mother's parents, who held a small highland farm from the Duke of Argyll. On the death of his grandparents, he went to live with his father, then in business at Ayr. There he says he often saw ‘the celebrated Scotch bard, Robert Burns,’ and he adds, ‘I think I never saw him sober—to my knowledge.’ In 1794 he was working in a ropery at Howdon dock, and in the following year he joined the Northumberland regiment of militia at Durham. On his discharge in 1805 he ‘got a patent for shoes, and began to study the perpetual motion, and discovered it at the result of thirty-seven different inventions,’ including original contrivances for fan ventilators, safety lamps, and railways. The pretensions of Sir Humphry Davy and George Stephenson to discoveries in the same field he denounced as dishonest, and claimed to have confuted Newton's theory of gravitation. Martin proceeded in 1808 to London, where he exhibited and sold (for an absurdly small sum) his foolish and redundant patent for perpetual motion (see, Perpetuum Mobile, 2nd ser. p. 200). In the following year he returned to his modest trade of rope-making, and in 1810 to the militia. Passing over to Ireland with his regiment, he made shift to acquire during his moments of leisure the elements of line engraving.

Despite his quackery and buffoonery, Martin possessed much ingenuity as a mechanician, and in 1814 was presented with the Isis silver medal by the Society of Arts for the invention of a spring weighing machine with circular dial and index. In the same year he married ‘a celebrated dressmaker,’ whom he also describes as ‘an inoffensive woman’ (she died 16 Jan. 1832), and founded the ‘Martinean Society,’ based, in opposition to the Royal Society, upon the negation of the Newtonian theory of gravitation. In 1821 he published ‘A New System of Natural Philosophy on the Principle of Perpetual Motion, with a Variety of other Useful Discoveries.’ He henceforth styled himself ‘Anti-Newtonian,’ and commenced a series of lectures setting forth his views in the Newcastle district. In 1830 he made an extended lecturing tour throughout England, from which he returned triumphant, declaring that no one had dared to defend the Newtonian system. In 1833 he issued in his followers' behoof ‘A Short Outline of the Philosopher's Life, from being a Child in Frocks to the Present Day, after the Defeat of all Impostors, False Philosophers, since the Creation. … The Burning of York Minster is not left out, and an Ac-