Bishopsgate, and in September 1731 he was collated to the rectory of Finchley, Middlesex. He was chaplain to Bishop Gibson, and one of the chaplains-in-ordinary to George II. He died at Finchley on 11 April 1743, and was buried in the churchyard of that parish.
By his will he left 3,000l. to Bishop Gibson, who generously gave the money to the testator's poor relations (Whiston, Memoirs, p. 251). He also bequeathed 1,000l. to Queen Anne's Bounty fund, and a like amount to Sir Clement Cotterell Dormer, knight, master of the ceremonies, in remembrance of the many favours received from him when they were at college together.
Cole relates that he was a good Greek scholar, and that he lent his notes and observations to Dr. Bentley, from whom he could never recover them (Addit. MS. 5865, f. 117).
He published several single sermons, of which the following deserve special notice:
- ‘Oratio in Martyrium regis Caroli I coram Academia Cantabrigiensi habita in Templo Beatæ Mariæ tricesimo die Jan. 1719,’ London (two editions), 1720, 4to; reprinted with his collected sermons.
- ‘The Duty of Promoting the Public Peace,’ preached before the lord mayor 30 Jan. 1723–4, being the anniversary of the martyrdom of Charles I, London (two editions), 1724, 8vo.
- ‘A Sermon preached before the House of Commons, Jan. 30, 1734–5, being the Anniversary-Fast for the Martyrdom of King Charles the First,’ London, 1735, 4to.
- ‘A Sermon occasion'd by the death of Queen Caroline,’ London [1737], 4to.
A volume of ‘Dr. Crowe's favourite and most excellent Sermons,’ eleven in number, appeared at London in 1759, 8vo (Darling, Cycl. Bibliographica, i. 831). Watt (Bibl. Brit.) mentions an edition of 1744. These sermons were published by the trustees of Queen Anne's Bounty, to whom the author bequeathed 200l. to defray the expense of printing them. Crowe contributed some Greek verses to the Cambridge University collection on the peace of Utrecht.
His portrait has been engraved by J. Smith (Evans, Cat. of Engraved Portraits, No. 14776).
[Authorities quoted above; also Malcolm's Londinium Redivivum, iv. 482; Gent. Mag. i. 405, xiii. 218; Lysons's Environs, ii. 340; Lond. Mag. 1743, p. 205; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. ii. 52.]
CROWE, WILLIAM (1745–1829), poet and divine, was born at Midgham, Berkshire, and baptised 13 Oct. 1745, but his father, a carpenter by trade, lived during Crowe's childhood at Winchester, where the boy, who was endowed with musical tastes and possessed a rich voice, was occasionally employed as a chorister in Winchester College chapel. At the election in 1758 he was placed on the roll for admission as a scholar at the college, and was duly elected a ‘poor scholar.’ He was fifth on the roll for New College at the election in 1764, and succeeded to a vacancy on 11 Aug. 1765. After two years of probation he was admitted as fellow in 1767, and became a tutor of his college, in which position his services are said to have been highly valued. On 10 Oct. 1773 he took the degree of B.C.L. His fellowship he continued to hold until November 1783, although, according to Tom Moore, he had several years previously married ‘a fruitwoman's daughter at Oxford’ and had become the father of several children. In 1782, on the presentation of his college, he was admitted to the rectory of Stoke Abbas in Dorsetshire, which he exchanged for Alton Barnes in Wiltshire in 1787, and on 2 April 1784 he was elected the public orator of his university. This position and the rectory of Alton Barnes Crowe retained until his death in 1829, and the duties attaching to the public oratorship were discharged by him until he was far advanced in years. According to the ‘Clerical Guide’ he was also rector until his death of Llanymynech in Denbighshire, worth about 400l. per annum, from 1805, and incumbent of Saxton in Yorkshire, valued at about 80l. a year, from the same date. A portrait of Crowe is preserved in New College library. A grace for the degree of D.C.L. was passed by his college on 30 March 1780, but he does not seem to have proceeded to take it. Many anecdotes are told of his eccentric speech and his rustic address, but Crowe's simplicity, says Moore, was ‘very delightful.’ In politics he was ‘ultra-whig, almost a republican,’ and he sympathised with the early stages of the French revolution. His expenditure was carefully limited, and he was accustomed to walk from his living in Wiltshire to his college at Oxford. Often was he noticed striding along the roads between the two places, with his coat and a few articles of underclothing flung over a stick, and with his boots covered with dust. Graduates of the university extending their afternoon walks a few miles into the country might see him sitting on a bench outside a village inn correcting the notes of the sermons which he was to deliver at St. Mary's, or of the orations with which he was to present to his university the chief personages in Europe. Nevertheless his appearances in the pulpit or in the theatre at Oxford were always welcomed by the gra-
