Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Hodgetts, James Frederick
HODGETTS, JAMES FREDERICK (1828–1906), commander and archæologist, son of James Hodgetts (d. 1830) by his wife Judith, daughter of Richard May, portrait painter, was born in London on 18 Jan. 1828. After his father's death his mother married Edward William Brayley [q. v.]. Hodgetts did not get on with his stepfather, who educated him for a scientific career. As a boy he assisted Sir Samuel Rush Meyrick [q. v.] in the arrangement of the Tower armoury. At an early age he went to sea, was in the East India Company's service in the Burmese war of 1851, became commander in the Indian navy, was wrecked, and had a narrow escape from drowning off the coast of Australia. He volunteered for service in the Crimean war; not being accepted, he became professor of seamanship at the Prussian naval cadets' school in Berlin till 1866, when the school was abolished. Having studied Russian in India, he transferred his services at the suggestion of Sir Roderick Impey Murchison [q. v.] to St. Petersburg and Moscow, where he lectured as professor in the Imperial College of Practical Science till his retirement in 1881. Coming to London, he patented a design for ships' hulls, which was not carried out; wrote stories for boys in the 'Boys' Own Paper' ('Harold the Boy Earl ' being the first), afterwards published separately; and wrote and lectured on archæological subjects, contributing to the 'Journal of the British Archaeological Association' and to the 'Antiquary.' He was engaged on an unfinished fife of Alfred the Great. , He died at his residence, 24 Cheniston Gardens, Kensington, on 24 April 1906. He married (1) in 1858 Isabella Gough (d. 1862), by whom he had a son, Edward Arthur Brayley Hodgetts; and (2) in 1867 Augusta Louisa von Dreger, by whom he had one daughter.
Among his publications were : 1. 'Ivan Dobroff: a Russian Story,' Philadelphia, 1866. 2. 'Anglo-Saxon Dress and Food,' &c., 1884 (lectures at the International Health Exhibition). 3. 'Anglo-Saxon Dwellings,' &c., 1884 (ditto). 4. 'Older England,' &c., 1884 (six lectures at the British Museum). 6. 'Older England,' &c., second series, 1884 (ditto). 6. 'The Champion of Odin; or, Viking Life,' &c., 1885. 7. 'The English in the Middle Ages,' 1885. 8. 'Greater England,' &c.. 1887 (on the consolidation of the colonial empire). 9. 'Edwin, the Boy Outlaw,' 1887.
[The Times, 26 April 1906; Athenæum, 5 May 1906 ; Annual Register, 1906; private information.]