(1807). In 1807 he was appointed to a resident tutorship at King's. He formed an intimate friendship with Byron, whom he visited at Newstead in 1808. In 1810 Hodgson's father died, and he undertook to pay his debts, which embarrassed him for several years until he was cleared in 1813 by a gift from Byron of 1,000l. He gave a bond for the amount, which Byron omitted to destroy, and payment was afterwards demanded by the poet's executors. Meanwhile in 1809 Hodgson had published ‘Lady Jane Grey’ and other poems, and in 1810–11 had held a long correspondence with Byron, then abroad, on religious and other topics. In 1812 he published ‘Leaves of Laurel.’ In 1815 he was presented to the curacy of Bradden, Northamptonshire, and in 1816 to the living of Bakewell, Derbyshire. He had some correspondence with Lord Byron and Mrs. Leigh in regard to the separation of Lord and Lady Byron. He made an appeal to Lady Byron, who replied civilly, but he did not discover the cause of the quarrel.
In 1836 Hodgson became archdeacon of Derby, and in 1838 was presented to Edensor, which he held together with Bakewell. In 1840, by the queen's desire, he was appointed provost of Eton, and soon afterwards rector of Cottesford. He sanctioned the reforms suggested by Edward Craven Hawtrey [q. v.], the head-master. Hodgson died at Eton on 29 Dec. 1852. In 1814 he married his first wife, Miss Tayler, who died in 1833, and in 1838 his second wife, Elizabeth, daughter of Lord Denman. Besides the works already noticed, Hodgson published: 1. ‘Sir Edgar, a Tale,’ &c., 1810. 2. ‘Charlemagne, or The Church Delivered’ (trans. from the French of Lucien Buonaparte by Rev. S. Butler and Rev. F. Hodgson, 1815). 3. ‘The Friends, a Poem,’ 1818 (cf. Smiles, Murray, ii. 34). 4. ‘Mythology for Versification’ (ed. by F. C. Hodgson, 1862; 2nd ed. 1866).
[Sir J. Arnould's Memoir of Lord Denman, 1873, i. 16, 39, 82, 115, 294, ii. 87–8, 104–6, 218–24, 342; J. T. Hodgson's Memoir of Rev. F. Hodgson, 1878 (chiefly correspondence); Moore's Diary, v. 191, 216, 251; Moore's Life of Byron. Table Talk of B. R. Haydon (ii. 367–8) gives on the authority of Hobhouse an apparently spiteful account of Hodgson's relations to Byron.]
HODGSON, JAMES (1672–1755), mathematical teacher and writer, was born in 1672. In 1703 he was elected fellow, and in 1733 one of the council, of the Royal Society. For many years before his death he was master of the Royal School of Mathematics at Christ's Hospital. Hodgson was a friend of John Flamsteed [q. v.], married his niece, and took part in the controversies in which Flamsteed was engaged. When Flamsteed died Hodgson assisted his widow in the publication of her husband's works, and he appears as co-editor of the ‘Atlas Cœlestis,’ published in 1729. The share, however, which Joseph Crosthwaite had in preparing Flamsteed's posthumous works for the press was never acknowledged. Hodgson died on 25 June 1755, leaving a widow and several children. His portrait by T. Gibson was engraved in mezzotint by G. White. He wrote, besides papers in the ‘Philosophical Transactions’ (vols. xxxvii–xlix.), 1. ‘The Theory of Navigation,’ 1706, 4to. 2. ‘The Laws of Stereographick Projection …,’ printed in ‘Miscellanea Curiosa,’ vol. ii., 1708, 8vo. 3. ‘A System of the Mathematics,’ 1723. 4. ‘The Doctrine of Fluxions founded on Sir Isaac Newton's Method …,’ 1736, 4to. 5. ‘An Introduction to Chronology,’ 1747, 8vo. 6. ‘A Treatise on Annuities,’ 1747. 7. ‘The Theory of Jupiter's Satellites,’ 1750. He also prefixed a short treatise on ‘The Theory of Perspective’ to the English translation of the French jesuit's work on perspective, a fourth edition of which was published in 1765.
[Gent. Mag. 1755, p. 284; Life of Flamsteed in this Dict.; Baily's Account of the Rev. John Flamsteed; Thomson's Hist. of Roy. Soc.; Roy. Soc. Lists; Noble's Granger, iii. 359; Bromley's Cat. of British Portraits.]
HODGSON, JOHN (d. 1684), autobiographer, a Yorkshire gentleman, who resided near Halifax, took up arms on the side of the parliament in the civil wars in December 1642, at the instigation of Andrew Latham of Coley Chapel, when Sir William Saville attacked Bradford. He began his military service as ensign to Captain Nathaniel Bowers in the regiment of Colonel Forbes, and fought under Sir Thomas Fairfax at the capture of Leeds and Wakefield and in the defeats of Seacroft Moor and Atherton Moor. When the Marquis of Newcastle captured Bradford (July 1643), Hodgson was made prisoner and stripped, but, being released, he made his way to Rochdale, where he had a fever. Mustering afresh at Thornhall in Craven, Hodgson and his companions joined Fairfax at Knutsford Heath, to undertake the attack on Lord Byron at Nantwich (January 1644). Hodgson then entered Colonel Bright's regiment [see Bright, John], under whom he served till 1650. He took part in the sieges of Pontefract in 1645 and 1648. In the battle of Preston (August 1648) Hodgson, still only a lieutenant in Captain Spencer's company of Bright's regiment, was one of the leaders of the ‘forlorn of foot.’ In this campaign he followed
