Thomas Chatterton Manuscript Project
Key People
Rev. Alexander Catcott
1725 - 1799
(Brother of George Catcott)
Reverend Alexander Catcott (sorry no portrait), brother of George Symes Catcott, and Martha Catcott, was vicar of Temple Church (shown above). Much of the church was destroyed in the Blitz, but the tower and some walls of the church remain to this day.
The church is a short walk from Chatterton's home; his family would have attended services at the church and would have been well known to Reverend Catcott.
It would seem that the Reverend was not fooled by Chatterton and believed he had the ability to create Rowley. However, according to George Catcott, when Chatterton gave Alexander a copy of 'Rowley’s Fragment of a Sermon on the Divinity of the Holie Spryte,' it was in 'modern' English transcribed by Chatterton, rather than the 'original.' This was, supposedly, because Chatterton had at first given him the 'Fragment' as written by 'Rowley', and Alexander was not used to reading obsolete English. Click the above link to read more of George's memories.
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At some point Alexander annoyed Chatterton by criticising his poetry, which drove Chatterton to write his satirical attack 'Epistle to the Reverend Mr. Catcott', but Catcott wouldn't see the Epistle until it was published in 1784. The original handwritten copy of this work was found in Chatterton's personal copy of Catcott's 'A Treatise on the Deluge', 1768. It is likely that Alexander gifted the book to Chatterton in return for 'Rowley's Fragment', and possibly some other works.
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Chatterton's copy of the 'Treatise' complete with his handwritten copies of six poems etc., can be read in full here : View
Chatterton's Epistle to Alexander Catcott : View
Chatterton's Personal Copy of
'A Treatise on The Deluge'*
with
Chatterton’s Autograph Works
Written on the blank endpapers.
The history of the book is interesting, and needs a little more research, however I have made a start:
A key name in the provenance is John Oldham. He, according to Meyerstein, was button seller, of the button and silk warehouse, 25 Lombard Street, who married John Lambert, the attorney's, sister Beliza, two years after Chatterton's death (in Holden's 1802-4 Directory, and the Post Office Directory for 1809 in Beliza's name)
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1768-69 : Reverend Alexander Catcott.
1769-70 : Thomas Chatterton - A gift from Alexander Catcott.
Jos Oldham from Chatterton's attic room in Holborn ???? Was he a visitor to the room?
????- 1792 Jos Oldham
1792-1812 Christopher Jeasperson (A gift from Jos Oldham)
1812-???? Christopher Jeasperson (Without the two leaves of Heccar and Gaira)
1858-1877 : W. D. Macray (without the two leaves of Heccar and Gaira)
1877- current : Bodleian Library.
1812-1931+ Mrs Roberts. The two leaves of Heccar and Gaira owned by Mrs Roberts, a gift from Chris Jeasperson
​1931+- 1955 E. H.W.Meyerstein (the two leaves of Heccar and Gaira)
spine titles were added after the book was discovered in a pub by Mr. W. D. Macray, or by the Bodleian when they purchased the book from him for £15 in 1877, the equivalent of £2,269 in 2026.
Works of Rev. Alexander Catcott
Remarks on the Second Part of The Lord Bishop of Clogher's ... Mosaic account of the Creation and Deluge, 1756.
The following link has only Part 1 of this edition. At the bottom of the last page of Part 1, is a note explaining why :
"The Second Part of this Treatise, viz. REMARKS on his Lordships account of the Deluge, is nearly finished, and designed to be printed in due time." : View
A Treatise on the Deluge, 1768 : View
​This volume includes, on page 419, a paraphrase of psalm 104 by Alexander Stopford Catcott (father of Alex and George Catcott).
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(As an aside, a previous owner of my copy of the 1768 edition of A Treatise on the Deluge, was Reverend Philip Homan, died 1848 : View He owned Shurock house, now a ruin : View I have added this to check later if it is relevant)
Chatterton's African Eclogues and the Deluge by Wylie Sypher
PMLA, Vol. 54, No. 1 (Mar., 1939), pp. 246-260 (15 pages) : Available online at Jstor : View
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Extract from the above:
Some have credited Coleridge's Kubla Khan with a 'magic' lacking to almost every other poem in English. Though more finished in its artistry, Kubla Khan is, however, no more 'magic' than parts of Chatterton's African Eclogues; in fact, as E. H. W. Meyerstein, in his excellent Life of Chatterton, was apparently the first critic to point out, there are sundry arresting likenesses between these Eclogues and Kubla Khan. Since the Rowley poet is in his strange 'romantic' way similar to Coleridge, is it possible to penetrate the 'shaping spirit of imagination' behind the African Eclogues, as Mr. Lowes has penetrated the imagination behind Kubla Khan? The purpose of this discussion is to show the manifold effects of the Rev. Alexander Catcott's Treatise on the Deluge on three 'magic' poems.