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This page is part of a website based
on the life and achievements of eighteenth-century inventor Henry Cort. Please email site controller Eric Alexander
with any comments or queries. |
JAMES
WATSON
A lawyer
who becomes a judge. An MP. There is some useful documentation on Sir
James Watson.
His early
career, however, is as minister to a dissenting congregation in Gosport.
He enters
the Cort story by marrying
John Attwick's granddaughter Joanna Burges. Cort's wife is also a granddaughter, thus Joanna's first cousin.
This
relationship becomes useful to Cort, though some of the use is conjecture.
Conjecture:
he helps to get Cort' patents awarded.
Fact:
Cort consults him when he suspects his inventions are
being pirated.
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In May 1787, Crawshay being at Fontley, Mr. Cort wrote Mr. Sergt
Watson that Mr. C-y said he was entitled to the making Iron – see his letter
to the Sergeant 28th May 1787 – but that Mr. C-y doubted him being
entitled to the Rolls – but Mr. C-y’s son William was by at the time &
said he believed it was his right & added this remark that there never
was any Mill whatever charged with Blooms to roll the same into Bars before
Mr. Cort’s process – that Wilkinson Raby & Horshell might have used grooved rollers
for rolling bar iron of one form into bar iron of another form. From Weale collection |
Conjecture:
he helps, after Cort's business collapse, to find Cort accommodation
in London, and supports financially.
Fact: he supplies information to Henry
Dundas about Cort's history.
Conjecture:
he is instrumental in getting his contacts to sign the 1791
petition on behalf of Cort.
Fact: his signature is on the petition.
By this
time he has become MP for Bridport, he has friends in the City and interests in
the British East India Company (which may account for his familiarity with
Dundas). His father-in-law, Thomas Burges, is a member of the company in Calcutta.
He has to
give up his parliamentary seat in 1795, when he is appointed
to the Bench in India.
But he
gets a knighthood in compensation.
Before he
leaves, he tries to persuade the Bridport electors to accept his brother-in-law
Thomas Burges (junior) in his place.
The
election takes place after he has left, but he is unsuccessful.
He is
accompanied on the voyage by Henry Cort's second son,
Coningsby, who hopes to gain advancement from the family connection. He is soon disappointed, as a brief
biography of Watson shows.
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About three weeks after his arrival,
not liking the house he inhabited, [he] purchased a very excellent one at
Chouringee, the removing into which terminated his mortal career. Like many other opinionated new comers he
affected to hold in contempt the prevalent and justly formed notion that the
sun was peculiarly injurious in Bengal, avowing that he had no doubt but any
man might go out in it, without more detriment than in other hot countries,
and this he put into practice, exposing himself to its burning rays several
hours superintending the loading of the hackerys that were transporting his
furniture from one house to the other...
On the second day, he said he felt rather uncomfortable, with a great
degree of giddiness. He lay down upon
a sofa, and before sufficient time elapsed to summon medical assistance, he
breathed his last [2 May 1796].
From R.G. Thorne, The History of Parliament: The House of Commons
1790-1820 |
Since he
has been knighted, his widow takes the title Dame Joanna Watson.
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Dame.. the
legal title of the wife of a knight or baronet From Shorter Oxford
English Dictionary, 1975 edition |
Related pages |
henrycort.net
p15