Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Grey, William (fl.1649)

644375Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 23 — Grey, William (fl.1649)1890Gordon Goodwin

GREY, WILLIAM (fl. 1649), topographer, a burgess of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, is supposed to have been an ancestor of the Greys of Backworth (Brand, Hist. of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, i., Preface). He was the first to publish an account of his native town in a meagre outline, entitled 'Chorographia, or a Svrvey of Nevvcastle upon Tine … as also a relation of the county of Northumberland,' &c. [dedication and preface signed W. G.], 4to, London, 1649, but printed at Newcastle by S[tephen] B[ulkeley]. A survey of the river Tyne by Hollar is prefixed to some copies of the tract. It has been reprinted in vol. iii. of both quarto editions of the 'Harleian Miscellany;' by the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 1813, folio; and in 1818 in octavo by the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Typographical Society, under the editorship of William Garret.

There is extant among the town records an agreement made on 26 July 1647 between the corporation of Newcastle and William Grey, probably the topographer, concerning the water to be conveyed from the latter's conduit in Pandon Bank to Sandgate (M. A. Richardson, The Local Historian's Table Book, i. 278).

[Authorities cited; Lowndes's Bibl. Manual (Bohn), ii. 945, Supplement, p. 162.]

G. G.