Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/338

 Sarah Trimmer [q. v.] (cf. Life and Writings of Mrs. Trimmer, 1825, p. 429). In 1806 appeared in two volumes a similar series of ‘Letters to a Young Lady.’ It was dedicated to the queen, who in 1799 had, on the advice of a bishop, purchased Mrs. West's soundly moral novels and plays (cf. Gent. Mag. 1799, ii. 1128). The young lady to whom the letters were addressed was Miss Maunsell, who died in her twenty-fifth year, 14 Aug. 1808. A second edition, in three volumes, was published the same year, and a fourth edition in 1811.

In 1810 Mrs. West paid a visit to Dromore. Her husband died on 23 Jan. 1823. Her last publication, ‘Ringrove, or Old-fashioned Notions,’ a novel in two volumes, appeared in 1827. In the introduction she states that she is writing again, after a silence of ten years. Her death took place on 25 March 1852 at Little Bowden.

Mrs. West's novels are better than her poems, and her poems are better than her plays. Miss Seward, however, praises her poems, but finds her tragedy ‘Edmund’ cold and declamatory (cf. Letters, iii. 113, 132). Mrs. West's poems were largely inspired by Gray, and her prose writings testified to a hatred of the new ideas of Mary Wollstonecraft and her school.

Other works by Mrs. West (many issued anonymously) are: 1. ‘Miscellaneous Poems, Translations, and Imitations,’ 1780. 2. ‘Miscellaneous Poetry,’ 1786. 3. ‘The Humours of Brighthelmstone: a Poem,’ 1788. 4. ‘Miscellaneous Poems and a Tragedy [called ‘Edmund’],’ 1791; other editions 1797 and 1804. 5. ‘The Gossip's Story,’ 1797, 2 vols. 6. ‘Elegy on Edmund Burke,’ 1797. 7. ‘Poems and Plays [including a second and a third tragedy, called respectively ‘Adela’ and ‘The Minstrel,’ and a comedy, ‘How will it end’],’ 1799–1805, 4 vols. 8. ‘The Infidel Father: a Novel,’ 1802, 3 vols. 9. ‘The Mother: a Poem in five books,’ 1809; 2nd edit. 1810. 10. ‘The Refusal: a Novel,’ 1810, 3 vols. 11. ‘The Loyalists: an historical Novel,’ 1812, 3 vols. 12. ‘Select Translation of the Beauties of Massillon,’ 1812. 13. ‘Alicia de Lacy, an historical romance,’ 1814, 4 vols. 14. ‘Scriptural Essays adapted to the Holy Days of the Church of England,’ 1816, 2 vols.; another edition, 1817. She was for many years a contributor to the ‘Gentleman's Magazine.’

[Allibone's Dict. iii. 2652; Nichols's Illustrations of Lit. passim; Halkett and Laing's Anonymous and Pseudonymous Lit.; Reuss's Register of Living Authors, 1804; Baker's Biographia Dramatica, 1812; Gent. Mag. 1799–1852, passim.]  WEST, JOHN, first (1693–1766), born on 4 April 1693, was son of John West, sixth (or fifteenth) baron De La Warr of the second creation, by Margaret, daughter and heir of John Freeman, merchant, of London and Westminster. He was descended from Thomas West, third or twelfth baron De La Warr [q. v.] On his return from his travels in 1712 he was nominated standard-bearer of the band of gentlemen pensioners, and on 18 Aug. was appointed clerk-extraordinary of the privy council. He was returned to parliament as member for Grampound in Cornwall on 27 Jan. 1714–15, and in April of the same year was gazetted guidon and first major of the first troop of horse guards. Two years later, on 24 Dec. 1717, he became lieutenant-colonel, and in the following year was made verderer of Windsor Park. He succeeded to the peerage as seventh (or sixteenth) Baron De La Warr in 1723. On 3 June 1725 he was named lord of the bedchamber to George I, and on the revival of the order of the Bath in the same year was created a knight. He was sworn of the privy council in June 1731, on becoming treasurer of the household. He held that office for six years. In March 1736 he was sent on a special mission to Saxe-Gotha to conduct the Princess Augusta to England, where she was to marry Frederick, prince of Wales. They landed at Greenwich on 25 April. Lord Hervey thought that no fitter selection could have been made to disarm the jealousy of the prince, and that a more unpolished ambassador for such an occasion could not have been found in any of the Goth or Vandal courts of Germany. On 2 July of the following year De La Warr was appointed captain-general and governor of New York and New Jersey. But he did not leave England, where he had for some time begun to take an active part in public affairs. In February 1732 he had denounced the reintroduction of Samuel Sandys's pension bill, which had twice previously been rejected by the lords, as an indignity to the house. On 18 April of the following year he was chosen speaker of the House of Peers, during the absence of Peter King, baron King [q. v.], the chancellor (Lords' Journals, xxiv. 237). According to the same authority, De La Warr was in that year ‘very zealous in the bill against Edinburgh’ which followed the Porteous riots. In February 1739 he spoke against allowing counsel to the petitioners against the recent convention with Spain, citing the precedent of the merchants heard against Bolingbroke's commercial treaty with France. On 9 Feb. 1739 he moved that the author and publisher (Paul White-