lasted through life, with Thomas Bewick, the celebrated wood-engraver. On his coming to London his services were engaged by Mr. John Bell, who was then publishing the beautiful miniature editions of the ‘Poets’ and ‘Shakespeare,’ About 1787 he became acquainted with George Nicol, the bookseller, who was then considering the best method of completing the magnificent edition of Shakespeare which he had suggested to Messrs. Boydell, ornamented with designs by the first artists of this country. Premises were then engaged in Cleveland Row, St. James's, and the ‘Shakespeare Press’ was founded under the firm of 'W. Bulmer & Co.’ The publication of the ‘Shakespeare' (9 vols. 1791–1806, folio) established Bulmer’s fame as the first practical printer of the day, Next to it the edition of ‘The Poetical Works of Milton’ (3 vols, 1793–7, folio) is the finest production of his press. A curious and copious list of the works printed by him is given in Dibdin‘s ‘Bibliographical Decameron,’ ii. 384–95. Bulmer retired from business in 1819, and died in his house at Clapham Rise on 9 Sept. 1830. His portrait has been engraved.
[Gent. Mag, c. (ii.), 305; Hansard's Typographia (1825), 294, 315; Sykes's Local Records (1833), ii. 281; Nichols's Illustr. of Lit. viii, 465, 503, 525; Timperley's Encyclopædia of Literary and Typographical Anecdote (1842), 911; Evans’s Cat. of Engraved Portraits, 13354, 13355.]
BULSTRODE, EDWARD (1588–1659), lawyer, the second son of Edward Bulstrode of Hedgeley, near Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, by Cecilia, daughter of Sir John Croke of Chilton, was born in 1588. He became a commoner of St. John's College, Oxford, in 1603, but left it without a degree. He entered the Inner Temple 26 Jan. 1605, was called to the bar 13 Jan. 1613, and became a bencher 23 Nov. 1629. On 4 Nov. 1632 he became Lent reader of his inn, and in the time of the rebellion he was, by the favour of his nephew, Bulstrode Whitelock [q. v.], made one of the justices of North Wales in 1649. He was also employed as an itinerant justice, particularly in Warwickshire, in 1653, where he had an estate at Astley. He died in or near the Inner Temple about the beginning of April 1659, and on the 4th of that month was buried in the body of the church on the south side of the pulpit, he being than one of the masters of the bench. He was the author of ‘A Golden Chain; or, a Miscellany of diverse Sentences of the Sacred Scriptures, and of other Authors collected and linked together for the Soul’s Comfort,’ 1657; and is well known for his ‘Reports of divers Resolutions and Judgments,’ in three parts, 1657, 1668, and 1659, the whole reprinted with many new references in 1688, not 1691, as is stated by Wood.
[Wood’s Athenæ (Bliss), iii. 471–2; Fuller's Worthies, ed. Nichols, 1. 140, 149; Brit. Mus Cat.]
BULSTRODE, Sir RICHARD (1610–1711), soldier, diplomatist, and author, was the second son of Edward Bulstrode of the Inner Temple [q. v.], by Margaret, daughter of Richard Astley, chamberlain of the queen’s household, and was born in 1610 (Bysshe, Preface to Original Letters). He was educated at Pembroke College, Cambridge, and while still at the university printed a poem on the birth of the Duke of York. In November 1633 he entered the Inner Temple (Cook, Admissions to the Inner Temple, p. 276), of which he was in 1649, at the request of his father, created a bencher. The date of his entrance is of some importance in view of a statement of his own regarding the circumstances in which he was led to join the army of Charles at the outbreak of the civil war. ‘I was then,’ he says in ‘Memoirs of the Reign of Charles I,’ ‘very young and in a labyrinth, not knowing well which way to go; but at last I resolved to go to Whitehall with some gentlemen of the Inner Temple, being then newly come thither from Cambridge, where I had been bred in Pembroke Hall.’ The expression ‘very young’ must be interpreted as in comparison with his advanced age at the time he was writing, and the statement that in 1642 he was ‘newly come from Cambridge’ can be accounted for only by the dimness of his recollection. For some time he served in the Prince of Wales's regiment, and in 1643 he became adjutant to Lord Wilmot. Subsequently he was promoted adjutant-general of horse, and then quartermaster-general. Having in 1667 been appointed to take charge of Wentworth's funeral, he became responsible for the expenses, and to escape the importunity of the creditors went to Bruges, where he suffered a short imprisonment until Charles II fulfilled his obligations to pay the debt. On his release he obtained the auditorship to a Scotch regiment of foot then in service in the Netherlands. In 1673 he was appointed agent at the court of Brussels, and on his return to England in 1675 to give an account of certain negotiations he received the honour of knighthood. In a few months he returned to Brussels in the capacity of resident, and after the accession of Charles II he received the higher title of envoy.
