English Men of Letters: Coleridge

On the 21st of October 1772 there was added to that roll of famous Englishmen of whom Devonshire boasts the parentage a new and not its least illustrious name. SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE was the son of the Rev. John Coleridge, vicar of Ottery St. Mary in that county, and head master of Henry VIII.'s Free Grammar School in the same town. He was the youngest child of a large family. To the vicar, who had been twice married, his first wife had borne three children, and his second ten. Of these latter, however, one son died in infancy; four others, together with the only daughter...