Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Nichols, William Luke
NICHOLS, WILLIAM LUKE (1802–1889), antiquary, born at Gosport, Hampshire, 10 Aug. 1802, was the eldest son of Luke Nichols, of that place, merchant. He matriculated at Queen's College, Oxford, on 28 Feb. 1821, and graduated B.A. 1825, M.A. 1829. In 1827 he was ordained in the English church, being licensed to the curacy of Keynsham, Somerset. While the cholera was raging in England, he had the undivided care, as curate in sole charge, of the enormous parish of Bedminster, near Bristol. From 1 Feb. 1834 to 31 March 1839 he was minister of the church of St. James, Bath; for twelve months he was stationed at Trinity Church, Bath; he was then in charge of a district church near Ottery St. Mary, Devon; and from 1846 to 1851 he held on his own nomination the rectory of Buckland Monachorum, near Plymouth. Nichols then returned to Bath, where he dwelt in the east wing of Lansdown Crescent, collected a valuable library, and acquired a great knowledge of literature. In 1858, and for several years afterwards, he lived at the Wyke, on Grasmere. For two or three years before 1870 he resided at the old Manor House, Keynsham, but from that date until his death his home was at the Woodlands, on the borders of the Quantocks, in Somerset, and midway between Nether Stowey and Alfoxden. Nichols travelled frequently in foreign countries, and was well acquainted with the scenery and antiquities of Spain, Italy, Sicily, Greece, and Palestine. He died at the Woodlands on 25 Sept. 1889, and was buried with his parents in the family vault in Gosport churchyard on 2 Oct. By his will he left the parish the funds for the completion of a campanile, or bell-tower, which he had begun to erect. It cost, with the bells, the sum of 2,500l.
Nichols had great knowledge of literature, and frequently contributed to periodicals. He published at Bath in 1838 a pamphlet entitled ‘Horæ Romanæ, or a Visit to a Roman Villa,’ which was suggested by the discovery, during the formation of the Great Western Railway, of the site of a Roman villa at Newton St. Loe, near Bath. The account of the excavations was followed by a poem of 120 lines in blank verse (cf. Scarth, Aquæ Solis, pp. 114–15). Nichols edited in 1866 the ‘Remains of the Rev. Francis Kilvert’ [q .v.] He was elected F.S.A. on 2 Feb. 1865. He printed at Bath for private circulation in 1873 a paper on ‘The Quantocks and their Associations,’ which he read before the Bath Literary Club on 11 Dec. 1871. It was interesting to the lovers of Coleridge, Wordsworth, Sir Humphry Davy, Thelwall, and Charles Lloyd. A second edition, revised and enlarged, with map and eleven illustrations, came out in 1891. Among the illustrations were photographs of the author and of his house, The Woodlands.
[Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1715–1886; Guardian, 2 Oct. 1889, p. 1464; Bath Chronicle (by Mr. Peach and the Rev. H. M. Scarth), 3 and 10 Oct. 1889; Peach's Historic Houses in Bath, 2nd ser. p. 7.]