Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Musgrave, George Musgrave
MUSGRAVE, GEORGE MUSGRAVE (1798–1883), divine and topographer, born in the parish of St. Marylebone, London, 1 July 1798, was the eldest son of George Musgrave (d. 1861) of Marylebone and Shillington Manor, Bedfordshire, who married, 19 Aug. 1790, Margaret (d. 1859), only daughter of Edmund Kennedy. The son George was one of the earliest pupils of Charles Parr Burney, and on 17 Feb. 1816 he matriculated from Brasenose College, Oxford. He graduated B.A. 1819, when he took a second class in classics, and M.A. 1822, and he was ordained deacon 1822, and priest 1823. In 1824 he held the curacy of All Souls, Marylebone, and from 1826 to 1829 he served in the same position at the parish church of Marylebone. During the years 1835-8 he filled the rectory of Bexwell, near Downham, Norfolk, and he was vicar of Borden, Kent, from 1838 to 1854, when he resigned in favour of his son-in-law. Musgrave was lord of the manor of Borden as well as one of its chief landowners, and while vicar he filled the east and west windows of the church with stained glass to the memory of his relations. After 1854 he lived in retirement, first at Withycome-Raleigh, near Exmouth, Devonshire, then near Hyde Park, London, and lastly at Bath. During these years he travelled much in France, and he frequently lectured at local institutes on his tours or his antiquarian studies. Two prizes were founded by him at the Clergy Orphan Corporation School for Boys, St. Thomas's Mount, Canterbury, and three at its school for girls, St. John's Wood, London. He died at 13 Grosvenor Place, Bath, 26 Dec. 1883. His first wife, whom he married on 4 July 1827, was Charlotte Emily, youngest daughter of Thomas Oakes, formerly senior member of council and president of the board of revenue, Madras, and they had issue two sons and three daughters. He married, secondly, 24 July 1877, Charlotte Matilda, elder daughter of the Rev. William Stamer, rector of St. Saviour's, Bath, and widow of Richard Hall Appleyard, barrister-at-law. She died at Paignton 20 April 1893, and was buried at Bath. Musgrave was an assiduous traveller, and probably knew the surface of France better than any Englishman since Arthur Young's day. He also explored the recesses of Sicily and wandered on the coasts of the Adriatic, among the Apennines and the Alps, and by the Elbe and the Danube. In 1863 he issued, under the veil of 'Viator Verax, M.A.,' a pamphlet called 'Continental Excursions. Cautions for the First Tour,' which passed through four impressions in that year, and in 1866 passed into a fifth edition as 'Foreign Travel, or Cautions for the First Tour.' This brochure exposed, with some exaggeration, the impositions and indecencies of continental travelling. He published, moreover, seven books, narrating his leisurely and gossipping rambles in his favourite country of France. Their titles were : 1. 'Parson, Pen, and Pencil,' 1848, 3 vols., reissued in 1849 with the more exact description of 'Excursions to Paris, Tours, and Rouen.' 2. 'Ramble through Normandy, or Scenes, Characters, and Incidents in Calvados,' 1855. 3. 'Pilgrimage into Dauphine, with a Visit to the Grand Chartreuse,' 1857, 2 vols. 4. 'Byroads and Battle-fields in Picardy,' 1861. 5. 'Ten Days in a French Parsonage in the Summer of 1863,' 1864, 2 vols. 6. 'Nooks and Corners in Old France,' 1867, 2 vols. 7. 'Ramble into Brittany,' 1870, 2 vols.
When vicar of Borden, a living in an agricultural district, Musgrave published several useful works for the benefit of his parishioners, both young and old. Among them were : 1. 'Nine and Two, or School Hours ; a Book of Plain and Simple Instruction,' 1843. 2. An appendix thereto entitled ' A Vocabulary of Explanations, or List of Words and certain difficult Sentences in the Gospels,' 1843. 3. 'The Crowkeeper, or Thoughts in the Field,' 1846. 4. A new and improved edition called 'The Farm-boy's Friend, or Thoughts in the Field and Plantation,' 1847. 5. 'Plain and Simple Hymns for Public Worship in Agricultural Parishes,' 3rd edit., Sittingbourne, 1852. In his retirement he compiled : 6. 'A Manual of Plain, Short, and Intelligible Family Prayers,' 1865. 7. 'Psalter for Private Commune,' 1872. 8. 'Readings for Lent,' 1877.
Musgrave also published 'Translations from Tasso and Petrarch,' 1822, 'The Psalms of David in English blank verse,' 1833, and 'The Odyssey of Homer, rendered into English blank verse,' 1865, 2 vols.; 2nd edit, revised and corrected, 1869, 2 vols.
[Foster's Alumni Oxon.; Burke's Landed Gentry, 1886 ed. ; Men of the Time, llth ed.; Crockford, 1882 ed. ; Academy, 5 Jan. 1884, p. 9; Gent. Mag. 1861 pt.ii. p. 215.]