1804, and after receiving priest's orders in September 1805, was in the following month appointed professor of classics and history in the Royal Military College, then lately established at Great Marlow, Buckinghamshire, and he removed with the college to Sandhurst in October 1812. Resigning this appointment in 1822, he went to Britwell, near Burnham, where he prepared pupils for the universities, and served the curacy of Burnham until 1829, when he accepted the head-mastership of the free grammar school at Market Bosworth, Leicestershire. While resident at that place he held successively the curacies of Bosworth, Carlton, and Cadeby between 1829 and 1841. He never derived from his clerical profession more than 100l. a year. As a schoolmaster he was eminently successful. He died at Market Bosworth 8 Nov. 1854. In June 1819 he married Anne, third daughter of Captain Thomas Dickinson, R.N., of Bramblebury, near Woolwich, by whom he had six children. She died 10 May 1883, in her ninety-second year.
Evans was the author of the following works: 1. ‘Synopses for the use of the Students in the Royal Military Academy.’ 2. ‘The Cutter, in five Lectures on the Art and Practice of Cutting Friends, Acquaintances, and Relations,’ 1808. 3. ‘Fungusiana, or the Opinions and Table-talk of the late Barnaby Fungus, Esq.,’ 1809. 4. ‘The Curate and other Poems,’ 1810. 5. ‘Plain Sermons on the relative Duties of the Poor as Parents, Husbands, and Wives,’ 1822. 6. ‘Present National Delusions upon Wisdom, Power, and Riches,’ 1831. 7. ‘Sermons on the Christian Life and Character,’ 1832. 8. ‘Effectual Means of Promoting and Propagating the Gospel,’ 1836. 9. ‘The Phylactery,’ a poem, 1836. 10. ‘Calamus Scriptorius, or Copies for writing Greek,’ 1837. 11. ‘The Fifth of November,’ a sermon, 1838. 12. ‘The Village Church,’ a poem, 1843. 13. ‘Education and Parental Example, in imitation of the XIVth satire of Juvenal,’ a poem, 1843. 14. ‘The Sanctuary Service and not the Sermon the great object of Public Worship,’ 1843. 15. ‘The Layman's Test of the true Minister of the Church of England.’ 16. ‘Divine Denunciations against Drinking, or the Word of God more powerful than Pledge-taking.’ 17. ‘Leicestershire Words, Phrases, and Proverbs,’ 1848. Reprinted by the English Dialect Society, 1881. 18. ‘Personal Piety, or Aids to Private Prayer for Individuals of all classes,’ 1851. 19. ‘Britain's Wreck, or Breakers Ahead. By an Old Hand on Board,’ 1853. Of Evans's children John Evans, K.C.B., F.R.S. (1823–1908), was treasurer of the Royal Society (1878–98), president of the Society of Antiquaries (1885–92) and a writer on coins, and stone, bronze, and flint implements. Sebastian Evans, born 1830, is a designer for glass work and a poet; he edited the ‘Birmingham Gazette’ 1867–70, and was for some time the editor of ‘The People,’ a conservative Sunday journal. Anne Evans, born 1820, died 1870, wrote poems and music, which in 1880 were edited and published with a memorial preface by Anne Thackeray Ritchie.
[Gent. Mag. January 1855, pp. 100–2; Men of the Time (1887), p. 360.]
EVANS, BENJAMIN (1740–1821), congregational minister, was born at Ffynon-Adda, Meline, Pembrokeshire, 23 Feb. 1740. In his early days, while he was minister at Llanuwchllyn, Merionethshire (where he was ordained 1769), he met with a good deal of
persecution and was compelled to apply to the king's bench for a mandamus before he was allowed to conduct the services in peace. He
removed in 1777 to Haverfordwest, and thence to Drewen in Cardiganshire, 24 June 1779, where he was much beloved, and remained till his death, 3 March 1821. His first duty here was to undo the work of his predecessor, who was in sympathy with the Arminian movement, then led by the Rev. David Lloyd of Llwynrhydowen. Evans showed great tact and gradually and successfully led back the congregation to the prevailing Calvinism of the day. The baptist controversy which began about 1788 was originated by the great activity of a few baptists in the neighbourhood, who distributed large numbers of tracts among members of the congregation. This compelled the minister to act on the defensive. The historian of nonconformity in Wales says that probably nothing abler was ever written on both sides of this question of baptism than the letters of Evans on the one side and those of Dr. William Richards of Lynn on the other. According to the same authority Evans's services to his countrymen were very great, both through the pulpit and the press (Eglwysi Annybynol, iv. 174).
His published works are (all in Welsh): 1. Translation of a sermon on the gunpowder explosion at Chester, by Dr. J. Jenkins, 1772. 2. 'Letters on Baptism,' 1788; second edition, with additions in reply to Dr. Richards, 1789. 3. 'Sufferings of the Black Men in Jamaica, &c.,' 1789. 4. 'The Wailings of the Black Men in the Sugar Islands' (3 and 4 were published anonymously). 5. A poem on baptism in reply to the Rev. Benjamin Francis, 1790. 6. Translation of the Rev. Matthias Maurice's 'Social Religion,' 1797. 7. Two catechisms (1) 'On the great Principles of Religion,' (2) 'On the Principles of Non-
