Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 44.djvu/174

 ‘Friends' Subscription against Tithes’ to parliament (, Letters, p. 71). He acted as clerk to the general meeting of Durham Friends held on 1 Oct. 1659 (Letters, p. 292).

At the Restoration Pearson's loyalty was suspected. He was described as ‘the principal quaker in the north, having meetings of at least one hundred in his house almost every night, with two or three horse-loads of skeene knives and daggers concealed there’ (Hist. MSS. Comm. 7th Rep. p. 93 a). He admitted to having stored the arms, but for the service of the king (Cal. State Papers, 1661–2, p. 239). On 14 Dec. 1661 he was examined at Whitehall, and reported that he had lately been in Scotland by direction of Sir John Shaw and Sir Nicholas Crisp, that he had not corresponded with any one there since the Restoration, nor borne arms against the king. He was apprehended on 16 Jan. 1662 for being in London contrary to the proclamation, but released under a certificate of Sir [q. v.], secretary of state. After this he appears to have renounced his quakerism, in his endeavour to stand well with the monarchy, going so far as to say that, although he had ‘embraced the chimerical notions of those times and ran into excesses in his zeal for religion, he was still one of the best friends to the king's distressed servants or to expelled ministers.’ He protested that he was won over to different opinions many years ago, ‘when it was not seasonable to express them,’ by Sir William D'Arcy, and in proof of sincerity surrendered the delinquents' estates that he had bought (loc cit.) He was further employed in Edinburgh by the government (cf. Cal. State Papers, 1663–4, p. 191).

In 1665 he was under-sheriff for the county of Durham, and high in favour with the bishop, [q. v.], in whose nomination the office was (ib. 1664–5, p. 482, and 1665–6, p. 224). Pearson probably died at Ramshaw Hall in 1670. He appears to have been a man of many parts, and one who came to the front in whatever he did, but without much stability.

He married some time before May 1652. A daughter Grace married Giles Chambers, and became a noted quaker minister, travelling through England, Ireland, and Wales. She died in 1760, aged between 90 and 100 (Notes and Queries, 1st ser. xii. 520).

Pearson's work on tithes was reprinted, London and Dublin, 1730, and again in the same year (London, J. Sowle), with ‘an Appendix thereto.’ To which is added a ‘Defence of some other Principles held by the People called Quakers … By J. M.,’ i.e. [q. v.] Another edition, with a new appendix, consisting of ‘An Account of Tithes,’ by Thomas Ellwood, Thomas Bennett, and others, was published London, Luke Hinde, 1754, 8vo, and reprinted as the seventh edition, 1762. Subsequent editions have appeared, one by the Tract Association of the Society of Friends being dated 1850.



PEARSON, CHARLES HENRY (1830–1894), colonial minister and historian, born at Islington on 7 Sept. 1830, was fourth son of the Rev. [q. v.] His brother, Sir [q. v.] the judge, is separately noticed. He was a quiet boy, and, his parents belonging to the evangelical party, he was when quite young accustomed to read many religious books. Having, until the age of twelve, been taught by his father, he was in 1843 sent to Rugby school, where he remained until May 1846. After being for a year with a private tutor, he entered King's College, London, in 1847, and that year obtained the prize for English poetry. At King's College he was diligent, became a disciple of [q. v.], and highly valued the teaching of Professor [q. v.] While acting as a special constable on 10 April 1848, the day of the chartist demonstration, he contracted a chill, which brought on a long and severe illness and left permanent bad effects on his constitution. He matriculated as a commoner from Oriel College, Oxford, in June 1849, obtained a scholarship at Exeter College the next year, and was in the first class in the literæ humaniores examination in the Michaelmas term of 1852. He graduated B.A. in 1853, proceeding M.A. in 1856. From boyhood he knew French, and while an undergraduate he studied, in addition to his uni-