Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 39.djvu/265

Mudge  drawing, and for this purpose placed them before leaving college under Mr. Dawson of the ordnance survey for a course of practical study. Mudge's management of the cadets was so successful that in 1817 Lord Chatham wrote to express his high satisfaction at the result.

In 1813 it was determined to extend the meridian line into Scotland. Mudge superintended the general arrangement of the work, and in some cases took the actual measurement. It is to Mudge that Wordsworth alludes in his poem on 'Black Combe,' written in 1813. On the extension of the English arc of meridian into Scotland, the French Bureau des Longitudes applied for permission for Jean Baptiste Biot to make observations for them on that line. These observations were carried out by Biot, with the assistance of Mudge and of his son Richard Zachariah [q. v.], at Leith Fort on the Forth, and Biot assisted Mudge in extending the arc to Unst in the Shetland islands.

On 4 June 1813 Mudge was promoted brevet-colonel, and on 20 Dec. 1814 regimental colonel. In 1817 he received from the university of Edinburgh the degree of LL.D. In 1818 he travelled in France for the benefit of his health, and on his return was appointed a commissioner of the new board of longitude. In 1819 the king of Denmark visited the survey operations at Bagshot Heath, and presented Mudge with a gold chronometer. In May of this year he commenced the survey of Scotland, and on 12 Aug. he was promoted major-general. He died on 17 April 1820. With an amiable disposition and an even temper he was a careful and economical administrator.

Mudge's portrait was painted in 1804 by James Northcote, R.A., and the picture is in the possession of his granddaughter, Sophia Elizabeth, widow of the Rev. John Richard Bogue. Mudge married Margaret Jane, third daughter of Major-general Williamson, R.A., who survived him four years. He left a daughter, two sons in the royal engineers, one in the royal artillery, and one in the royal navy.

Mudge contributed to the Royal Society's 'Transactions:' 1. 'Account of the Trigonometrical Survey made in 1797, 1798, and 1799.' 2. 'Account of the Measurement of an Arc of the Meridian from Dunnose, Isle of Wight, to Clifton in Yorkshire.' 3. 'On the Measurement of Three Degrees of the Meridian conducted in England by William Mudge.'

Besides the maps of the survey published under his direction, he published: 1. 'General Survey of England and Wales,' pt. i. fol. 1805. 2. ' An Account of the Trigonometrical Survey carried on by Order of the Master-General of H.M. Ordnance in the years 1800-1809, by William Mudge and Thomas Colby.' 3. 'An Account of the Operations carried on for accomplishing a Trigonometrical Survey of England and Wales from the commencement in 1784 to the end of 1796. First published in, and now revised from, the "Philosophical Transactions," by William Mudge and Isaac Dalby. The Second Volume, continued from 1797 to the end of 1799, by William Mudge. The Third Volume, an Account of the Trigonometrical Survey in 1800, 1801, 1803 to 1809, by William Mudge and Thomas Colby,' 3 vols. 4to, London, 1799-1811. 4. ' Sailing Directions for the N.E., N., and N.W. Coasts of Ireland, partly drawn up by William Mudge, completed by G. A. Fraser,' 8vo, London, 1842.

 MUDGE, WILLIAM (1796–1837), commander in the navy, born in 1796, third son of Major-general William Mudge [q. v.], was promoted to be lieutenant in the navy on 19 Feb. 1815. In August 1821 he was appointed first lieutenant of the Barracouta, with Captain Cutfield, employed on the survey of the east coast of Africa under Captain W. F. Owen [q. v.] He was afterwards moved into the Leven under the immediate command of Owen, and on 4 Oct. 1825 was promoted to the rank of commander. He was then appointed to conduct the survey of the coast of Ireland, on which he was employed till his death at Howth, on 20 July 1837. He was buried with military honours in the ground of the cathedral at Howth on 24 July.

In addition to 'Sailing Directions for Dublin Bay and for the North Coast of Ireland,' which were officially published, 1842, Mudge contributed several papers (mostly hydrographic) to the 'Nautical Magazine;' and to the Society of Antiquaries, in November 1833, an interesting account of a prehistoric village found in a Donegal bog (Archæologia, xxvi. 261). He married in 1827 Mary Marinda, only child of William Rae of Blackheath, by whom he had a large family. He has been confused with his father (e.g. in Brit. Mus. Cat.), whose work, it will be seen, was entirely geodetic. [Flint's Mudge Memoirs; Marshall's Roy. Nav. Biog. xii. (vol. iv. pt. ii.) 175, Gent. Mag.