Sir Adolphus William Ward FRHistS FBA (2 December 1837 – 19 June 1924) was an English historian and man of letters.

Sir Adolphus Ward
Born2 December 1837
Hampstead, London, England
Died19 June 1924
Academic background
Alma materPeterhouse, Cambridge
Academic work
Discipline
Sub-disciplineMedieval history
Institutions

Life

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Ward was born at Hampstead, London, the son of John Ward. He was educated in Germany and at Peterhouse, Cambridge.[1]

In 1866, Ward was appointed professor of history and English literature in Owens College, Manchester, and was principal from 1890 to 1897, when he retired. He took an active part in the foundation of Victoria University, of which he was vice-chancellor from 1886 to 1890 and from 1894 to 1896,[2] and he was a founder of Withington Girls' School in 1890.[3] He was a Member of the Chetham Society, serving as a member of council from 1884 and as president from 1901 until 1915.[4]

In 1897, the freedom of the city of Manchester was conferred upon him, he delivered the Ford Lectures at the University of Oxford in 1898, and on 29 October 1900 he was elected master of Peterhouse, Cambridge.[5]

He was elected in 1903 a fellow of the British Academy and was the academy's president from 1911 to 1913.[1] In 1919 he delivered the British Academy's Shakespeare Lecture.[6][7]

Ward served as president of the Royal Historical Society from 1899 to 1901,[8] and he was knighted in 1913.[9]

Works

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Ward's major work is his standard History of English Dramatic Literature to the Age of Queen Anne (1875),[10] re-edited after a thorough revision in three volumes in 1899. He also wrote The House of Austria in the Thirty Years' War (1869),[11] Great Britain and Hanover: Some Aspects of the Personal Union (1899),[12] and The Electress Sophia and the Hanoverian Succession (1903) (2nd ed. 1909).[13][2] His Germany, 1815–1890 has three volumes.

Ward edited George Crabbe's Poems (2 vols., 1905–1906) and Alexander Pope's Poetical Works (1869); he wrote the volumes on Geoffrey Chaucer and Charles Dickens in the "English Men of Letters" series, translated Ernst Curtius's History of Greece (5 vols., 1868–1873); with G. W. Prothero and Stanley Mordaunt Leathes he edited the Cambridge Modern History between 1901 and 1912,[14] and with A. R. Waller edited the Cambridge History of English Literature (1907, etc.).[2]

Ward's collected papers were published in 5 volumes by Cambridge University Press in 1921.[15]

Notes

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  1. ^ a b "Ward, Adolphus William (WRT855AW)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
  2. ^ a b c   One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domainChisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Ward, Adolphus William". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 28 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 319.
  3. ^ Newsletter 1936-1937. Withington Girls' School. 5 February 1937.
  4. ^ "Chetham Society: Officers and Council" (PDF). Chetham Society. 4 November 2015. Archived from the original (PDF) on 17 November 2015. Retrieved 4 November 2015.
  5. ^ The colleges and halls – Peterhouse | British History Online
  6. ^ Ward, A. W. "Shakespeare and the Makers of Virginia". Proceedings of the British Academy, 1919–1920. 11: 141–185.
  7. ^ "Shakespeare Lectures". The British Academy.
  8. ^ "List of Presidents". Royal Historical Society. Archived from the original on 16 July 2011. Retrieved 20 December 2010.
  9. ^ "Birthday Honours". The Times. London, England. 3 June 1913. pp. 9–10. The distinguished historian and critic; Master of Peterhouse, Cambridge, since 1900; Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, 1901; one of the editors of the Cambridge Modern History of the Cambridge History of English Literature
  10. ^ books.google.com
  11. ^ The House of Austria in the Thirty Years' War, archive.org
  12. ^ Great Britain and Hanover: Some Aspects of the Personal Union, archive.org
  13. ^ The Electress Sophia and the Hanoverian Succession, archive.org
  14. ^ Leathes, Stanley; Gooch, G. P. (1924). "The Editorial Methods of Sir Adolphus Ward". Cambridge Historical Journal. 1 (2): 219–224. ISSN 1474-6913.
  15. ^ Hutton, W. H. (October 1922). "The Collected Papers of A. W. Ward". The Quarterly Review. 238: 314–326.
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Academic offices
Preceded by
Joseph Gouge Greenwood
Vice-Chancellor, Victoria University (UK)
1887–1891
Succeeded by
Preceded by Vice-Chancellor, Victoria University (UK)
1895–1897
Succeeded by
Preceded by Master of Peterhouse, Cambridge
1900–1924
Succeeded by
Preceded by Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge
1901–1902
Succeeded by
Professional and academic associations
Preceded by President of the Royal Historical Society
1899–1901
Succeeded by
Preceded by President of the Chetham Society
1901–15
Succeeded by