Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 53.djvu/110

 , Berkshire, by his wife Martha, daughter of Paul Dayrell, esq., of Lillingston Dayrell, Buckinghamshire, was born at Lillingston Dayrell, and baptised there on 20 Sept. 1590. He was sent for a short time to Oxford, but did not matriculate, and was afterwards articled to a solicitor in the city of London. On 15 Oct. 1644 he was admitted to the office of secondary of the Poultry Compter, which was worth about 700l. a year. On the death of his eldest son, John, in 1655 he sold his office and lived in retirement, spending most of his time in his library. Wood says ‘he was constantly known every day to walk his rounds among the booksellers' shops (especially in Little Britain) in London, and by his great skill and experience he made choice of such books that were not obvious to every man's eye.’ He was also a great collector of manuscripts, and he annotated many of the books in his extensive library. For a long time he resided in Little Moorfields. He died on 26 March 1675, and was buried in the church of St. Giles, Cripplegate.

By his wife Elizabeth, daughter of George Dean of Stepney, Middlesex, he had five sons and three daughters.

His valuable library was dispersed by auction in 1682, and produced 1,414l. 12s. 11d. A copy of the sale catalogue, ‘Bibliotheca Smithiana,’ with manuscript prices, is preserved in the British Museum. A manuscript catalogue of his books, with notes and observations in his autograph (1670), appears in Thomas Thorpe's ‘Catalogue of Manuscripts,’ 1836, No. 104.

He is now chiefly known as the compiler of: 1. ‘The Obituary of Richard Smyth … being a catalogue of all such persons as he knew in their life: extending from A.D. 1627 to A.D. 1674;’ which is extant in Sloane MS. in the British Museum, No. 886. A few extracts are preserved in the Harleian MS. 3361, in the handwriting of John Bagford; and a selection, perhaps to the amount of a fourth part, was printed by Peck in his ‘Desiderata Curiosa.’ The whole work was edited by Sir Henry Ellis, K.H., for the Camden Society in 1849.

Smith was also author of 2. ‘A Letter to Dr. Henry Hammond, concerning the Sence of that Article in the Creed, He descended into Hell,’ written in 1659, and printed, with Hammond's reply, London, 1684, 8vo. He left in manuscript a ‘Collection of Arms belonging to the name of Smith, in Colours,’ 8vo; such a collection, in 2 vols. 8vo, is now in the library of the College of Arms, but whether it be the same is not quite clear. Smith's manuscript remains also included ‘The Wonders of the World collected out of divers approved Authors;’ Sloane MS. 388; ‘Of the First Invention of the Art of Printing,’ Sloane MS. 772; ‘Observations concerning the Three Grand Impostors,’ Sloane MS. 1024.

His portrait, engraved by W. Sherwin, is very rare (, Biogr. Hist. of England, 1824, v. 186).

[Ayscough's Cat. of MSS.; Bromley's Cat. of Engraved Portraits, p. 129; Dibdin's Bibl. Decameron, iii. 74; Sir H. Ellis's Preface to the Obituary; Grazebrook's Heraldry of Fish, pref. p. xiii; Notes and Queries, 1st ser. ii. 389, 2nd ser. iii. 112, xi. 444, viii. 87; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss); Yeowell's Memoir of Oldys, p. 96.]

 SMITH, RICHARD BAIRD (1818–1861), chief engineer at the siege of Delhi, born on 31 Dec. 1818, was son of Richard Smith (1794–1863), surgeon, royal navy, of Lasswade, Midlothian, where he was in good private practice, by his wife, Margaret Young (1800–1829). He was educated at the Lasswade school and at Dunse Academy, entered the military college of the East India Company at Addiscombe on 6 Feb. 1835, and passed out at the end of his term, obtaining a commission as second lieutenant in the Madras engineers on 9 Dec. 1836. He went to Chatham for the usual course of professional instruction on 2 Feb. 1837 and left on 4 Oct., having obtained six months' leave of absence to enable him to improve himself in civil engineering and geology. He arrived at Madras on 6 July 1838, and was posted to the corps of Madras sappers and miners, joining the headquarters in the Nilgiri Hills on the 13th of the same month. He was appointed acting adjutant to the corps on 20 Feb. 1839. On 12 Aug., on an increase to the establishment of the Bengal engineers, Baird Smith was transferred to that corps, and on 23 Sept. was appointed adjutant. A week later he became temporarily an assistant to Captain M. R. Fitzgerald of the Bengal engineers in the canal and iron bridge department of the public works.

On 6 Jan. 1840 Baird Smith was appointed temporarily a member of the arsenal committee. On 12 Aug. he was appointed assistant to the superintendent of the Doab canal, Sir Proby Thomas Cautley [q. v.] On 28 Sept. he went to Dakha to relieve Captain Hunter in the charge of the 6th company of the Bengal sappers and miners on the march from Silhat to Danapur. He was relieved of this charge on 21 Jan. 1841. He was promoted to be first lieutenant on 28 Aug. 1841. On 30 Oct. 1844 his meteorological observations, which were considered ‘highly credit-