with his flag in the Thunderer, 74. He arrived at Bar does in the end of April, and in concert with Sir Ralph Abercromby undertook the conquest of St. Lucia, which capitulated 25 May. In October he returned to England, and the following year was sent out to the Cape of Good Hope as second in command. In 1798 he succeeded to the command-in-chief, but died suddenly, a few months later, November 1798. His wife, Anne, daughter of Mr. B. Leigh of Thorleigh, Isle of Wight, whom he had married in 1775, survived him by barely two months, and died in January 1799, leaving issue two daughters and two sons, the eldest of whom, Hood Hanway Christian, born in 1784, died a rear-admiral in 1851.
[Naval Chronicle, xxi. 177; Official Letters &c. in Public Record Office; Manx Note-book (1833, i. 100; O’Byrne’s Nav. Biog. Dict. (s. n. ‘Hood Hanway Christian’). ‘The Romantic Annals of a Naval Family] by Mrs. Arthur Traherne (daughter of Admiral Hanway Christian), professes to be a detailed sketch of the life and career of the author’s grandfather, of which she had no personal knowledge; and the book is so heavily loaded with fiction-or mistakes-that it is impossible to accept any one statement in it as having either historical or biographical value. As one instance of this it speaks of Christian’s father as Thomas, a captain in the navy, killed in a brawl in a gambling-house in London in 1753. There was at that time no Thomas Christian a captain in the navy, or an officer in the navy at all. There was an Edward Christian, but he was in the East Indies, 1744-9; was therefore not the father of a boy born in 1747, and did not die till 1758. Thomas Christian was probably captain of a privateer.]
CHRISTIAN, THOMAS (d. 1799), Manx writer, was the son of the Rev. John Christian, vicar of Kirk Marown in the Isle of Man. He succeeded his father in 1779. In 1796 he published at Douglas a translation of about four thousand lines of ‘Paradise Lost’ into Manx, which was reprinted by the Manx Society in vol. xx. of their publications. The work has no great merit, but is of some value to students of the language. Christian is said to have been ‘chiefly distinguished for his utter unfitness for the clerical office in every respect,' but he inherited the property of Ballakilley and Ballayemmy in the parish of Marown, and was appointed to the living through family influence. He died in 1795.
[Information supplied by Mr. A. W. Moore; Manx Soc. Pub. vol. xx.]
CHRISTIAN, WILLIAM (1608–1663), receiver-general of the Isle of Man (famous in Manx history under the name of Illiam Dhône, 'Brown-haired William'), was born on 14 April 1608. He was the third son of Ewan Christian, one of the deemsters or judges of the Isle of Man and deputy-governor of Peel Castle. In 1643 his father made over to him the estate of Ronaldsway. The circumstances of this transaction throw some light on Christian’s subsequent conduct. The landed property in the Isle of Man was anciently held by the feudal ‘tenure of the straw,’ which was nominally a tenancy at will under the lord of the island, but was by custom practically equivalent to a freehold. This tenure James, seventh earl of Derby and tenth lord of Man was as we learn from his own memoirs, anxious to abolish, and to substitute for it a system of leases for three lives. The innovation met with great opposition from the landholders, and the year resorted in several instances to high-handed measures. Ewan Christian had recently purchased the Ronaldsway property from his sister’s trustees, but there was some uncertainty with regard to the title, and the earl threatened to give; his support to a rival claimant. By way of compromise, Ewan agreed to make over the estate to his third son, the two elder sons having apparently refused to accept it on the proposed terms. Christian’s compliance in this matter gained for him the favour of the earl, who in 1648 appointed him to the lucrative post of receiver-general.
In 1651 the earl went to England with a body of Manx volunteers to join the royalist army. He shared in the defeat of Charles II at Worcester, was taken prisoner, and afterwards beheaded. Before leaving the island, he committed his wife (the celebrated Charlotte de la Tremoille) to the care of Christian, and also gave him the command of the insular troops. The exact nature of the part played by Christian in the subsequent transactions is extremely difficult to ascertain. The countess, on hearing that her husband was a prisoner made overtures to the parliament for the surrender of the island: in the hope of saving the earl’s life. These proposals were drawn up by Sir Philip Musgrave whom Lady Derby had appointed governor, and were despatched by special messenger to England. The same night which the messenger sailed there was an insurrection, headed by Christian, and participated in, according to Burton, Musgrave's biographer, by the greater part of the native population of the island. The insurgents seized all the smaller forts, but were unable to obtain possession of the two strong places of Peel Castle and Castle Rushen, in the latter of which the countess was then residing. According to Burton, they plundered
