Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/James, William (1635?-1663)
JAMES or JAMESIUS, WILLIAM (1635?–1663), scholar, son of Henry James, and grandson of a citizen of Bristol, was born about 1635 in Monmouthshire. He was first educated privately by his uncle, William Sutton, at Blandford Forum, Dorsetshire, ‘and being extraordinary rath-ripe, and of a prodigious memory, was entred into his accedence at five years of age’ (Wood, Athenæ Oxon. iii. 634). In 1646 he was elected a king's scholar at Westminster School, and ‘making marvellous proficiency under Mr. Busby, his most loving master’ (ib. p. 634), he was elected a student of Christ Church, Oxford, in 1650 (M.A. 1656). Before he took his degree Busby appointed him an assistant in the school. He contributed, with his schoolfellow, Dryden, English verses to John Hoddesdon's ‘Sion and Parnassus,’ 1650, small 8vo, and some Greek verses by him are prefixed to the ‘Horæ Subsecivæ’ of H. Stubbs, 1651, small 8vo. In 1651 he produced ‘Εἰσαγωγή in linguam Chaldaicam in usum scholæ Regiæ Westmon.,’ dedicated to ‘his tutor, parent, and patron,’ Busby; was made usher at Westminster in 1658, and helped to prepare ‘The English Introduction to the Latin Tongue, for the use of the Lower Forms in Westminster School,’ 1659. In 1661 he became second master (J. Welch, Alumni Westmonasterienses, new edit. 1852, p. 135). He died on 3 July 1663, aged about 28, ‘to the great reluctancy of all who knew his admirable parts,’ and was buried at the west end of Westminster Abbey, ‘near the lowest door, going into the cloister’ (Wood, Athenæ, iii. 634; J. Dart, History of Westminster Abbey, ii. 142).
James was one of Busby's favourite scholars. In the old library at Westminster School there are preserved among the Busby relics two neatly written manuscript Latin translations by James of Bacon's ‘Reginæ Elisabethæ fœlicitas,’ 1652, and the ‘Heros Laurentii,’ 1654, of Balthazar Gracian. The last is dedicated to Busby by his ‘filius et pupillus.’ In the same collection are also Hebrew, Arabic, and Greek vocabularies prepared by James.
[Authorities mentioned above, esp. Welch's Alumni Westmonasterienses.]