Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 45.djvu/329

 mayor read the Riot Act. The next day, Sunday, the rioters reassembled, and the mayor's life was in danger. The mob burnt and destroyed the mansion house, the bishop's palace, the custom-house, the excise office, the gaol, and two sides of Queen's Square. Finally the military, until then in a state of indecision, charged and fired on the people. About sixteen persons were killed, or perished in the flames, and one hundred were wounded or injured. Those rioters who were captured were tried by a special commission in Bristol in January 1832, when four of them were executed and twenty-two transported [see for the conduct of the troops,, 1782–1832].

On 25 Oct. 1832 Pinney was put on his trial in the court of king's bench, charged with neglect of duty in his office as mayor of Bristol during the riots. After a trial lasting seven days the jury returned a verdict of not guilty, asserting that Pinney ‘acted according to the best of his judgment, with zeal and personal courage.’ In 1836 he was chosen one of the first aldermen in the reformed corporation. He died at Camp House, Clifton, on 17 July 1867.

He married, on 7 March 1830, Frances Mary, fourth daughter of John Still of Knoyle, Wiltshire, and had issue Frederick Wake Preter Pinney of the Grange, Somerton; John Charles Pinney, vicar of Coleshill, Warwickshire; and a daughter.

[Nicholls and Taylor's Bristol, 1882, iii. 325–338; Bristol Liberal, 17 Sept. 1831, p. 3; Latimer's Annals of Bristol, 1887, pp. 146–79, 188, 212; Trial of Charles Pinney, Esq. 1833; Ann. Register, 1831 pp. 292, &c., 1832 pp. 5, &c.; Times, 30 Oct. 1831 et seq., 26 Oct. 1832 et seq.; Burke's Landed Gentry, 1886, ii. 1467–8; Gent. Mag. September 1867, p. 398.] 

PINNOCK, WILLIAM (1782–1843), publisher and educational writer, baptised at Alton, Hampshire, on 3 Feb. 1782, was son of John and Sarah Pinnock, who were in humble circumstances. He began life as a schoolmaster at Alton. He next became a bookseller there, and wrote and issued in 1810–11 ‘The Leisure Hour: a pleasing Pastime consisting of interesting and improving Subjects,’ with explanatory notes, and ‘The Universal Explanatory Spelling Book,’ with a key and exercises. About 1811 he removed his business to Newbury. In 1817 he came to London, and, together with Samuel Maunder [q. v.], bought the business premises of the ‘Literary Gazette,’ at 267 Strand, the partners also taking shares with Jerdan and Colburn in that periodical. Pinnock and Maunder ceased to print the paper after the hundred and forty-sixth number, and then entered upon the publication of a series of educational works. While at Alton, Pinnock had planned a system of ‘Catechisms,’ which Maunder now put into execution. Pinnock was advertised as the author, but did little of the literary work himself. The ‘Catechisms’ formed short manuals of popular instruction, by means of question and answer, on almost every conceivable subject. Eighty-three were issued at 9d. each, and some with a few illustrations. They met with extraordinary success, and were collected in ‘The Juvenile Cyclopædia.’ ‘The Catechism of Music’ was translated into German by C. F. Michaelis in 1825, and ‘The Catechism of Geography’ into French by J. G. Delavoye. The thirteenth edition of ‘The Catechism of Modern History’ was edited by W. Cooke Taylor (1829). Even greater success attended Pinnock's abridgments of Goldsmith's histories of England, Greece, and Rome, the first of which brought 2,000l. within a year. More than a hundred editions of these were sold before 1858. His series of county histories, which appeared collectively as ‘History and Topography of England and Wales’ in 1825, was also very successful, and he prepared new editions of ‘Mangnall's Questions’ and ‘Joyce's Scientific Dialogues.’ Jerdan was of opinion that he might have made from 4,000l. to 5,000l. a year by his publications. Unfortunately, however, he had a mania for speculation, and was obliged to part with most of his copyrights to Messrs. Whittaker and other publishers. He lost a large sum in an attempt to secure a monopoly of veneering wood, and sank further capital in manufacturing pianos out of it when he found it unsaleable. The result was that he was always in financial distress. He died in Broadley Terrace, Blandford Square, London, on 21 Oct. 1843.

Jerdan describes Pinnock as a ‘well-meaning and honest man ruined by an excitable temperament.’ The progress of popular education owed something to his cheap publications. Besides his eighty-three catechisms, grammars, and abridged histories, Pinnock issued: 1. ‘The Universal Explanatory English Reader … consisting of Selections in Prose and Poetry on interesting Subjects,’ 1813, 12mo, Winchester; 5th edit. enlarged, 1821, London. 2. ‘The Young Gentleman's Library of useful and entertaining Knowledge … with engravings by M. U. Sears,’ 1829, 8vo. 3. ‘The Young Lady's Library,’ &c. 1829. 4. ‘A Guide to Knowledge,’ 1833. 5. ‘A pictorial Miscellany for Intellectual Improvement,’ 1843.

A portrait of W. Pinnock, with autograph,