Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 53.djvu/33

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Smith
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Smith

of Romano-British coins. In conjunction with Thomas Wright he founded the British Archæological Association in 1843, and he frequently wrote in its journal. After his retirement to Strood he actively assisted in the work of the Kent Archæological Association, and contributed many papers to the ‘Archæologia Cantiana.’ For many years he compiled the monthly article of ‘Antiquarian Notes’ in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine.’ He was a writer in the ‘Athenæum,’ in the ‘Æliana’ of the Newcastle Society (of which he was a member), and in the ‘Transactions’ of several other antiquarian bodies. When, through the medium of his friend, the Abbé Cochet, he intervened successfully with Napoleon III for the preservation of the Roman walls of Dax, a medal was struck in France in his honour to commemorate the event (1858).

Smith was unmarried, and a sister kept house for him. She died in 1874, and was buried in Frindsbury churchyard. After a confinement to his bed for six days, he died at Temple Place on 2 Aug. 1890, and was buried in the same churchyard on 7 Aug. At a meeting, early in 1890, of the Society of Antiquaries, it had been proposed to strike a medal in his honour, and to present him with the balance of any fund that might be collected. The medal, in silver, was presented to him on 30 July (only three days before his death), and there remained for him the sum of one hundred guineas. A marble medallion by G. Fontana belongs to the Society of Antiquaries.

Smith's works comprised:

  1. ‘List of Roman Coins found near Strood,’ 1839.
  2. ‘Collectanea Antiqua: etchings and notices of ancient remains,’ 1848–80, 7 vols. The articles are chiefly on Roman remains, coins, ornaments, and monuments, in England, France, and Italy. The ‘notes on the antiquities of Treves, Mayence, Wiesbaden, Bonn, and Cologne’ in the second volume, the details in volume iii. of the ‘Faussett Collection of Anglo-Saxon Antiquities,’ and the account in the next volume of the public dinner to Smith at Newport, Isle of Wight, on 28 Aug. 1855, were issued separately in 1851, 1854, and 1855 respectively.
  3. ‘Antiquities of Richborough, Reculver, Lymne in Kent,’ 1850. A supplement on Lymne (in which he was assisted by James Elliott, jun.) came out in 1852, and one on Pevensey, with the aid of Mark Anthony Lower, was issued in 1858.
  4. ‘Inventorium Sepulchrale:’ the antiquities dug up in Kent, 1757–1773, by Rev. Bryan Faussett, 1856.
  5. ‘Illustrations of Roman London,’ 1859.
  6. ‘The Importance of Public Museums for Historical Collections,’ 1860.
  7. ‘Remarks on Shakespeare, his Birthplace,’ 1868; 2nd edit. 1877.
  8. ‘Rural Life of Shakespeare,’ 1870; 2nd edit. 1874; a third edition was afterwards in preparation.
  9. ‘South Kensington Museum Catalogue of Anglo-Saxon and other Antiquities discovered at Faversham by William Gibbs,’ 1871.
  10. . ‘Address to Strood Institute Elocution Class,’ 1879.
  11. ‘Retrospections, Social and Archæological,’ 1883, 1886, and 1891, 3 vols. Prefixed to volume i. is the medallion bust of him ‘from the marble by Signor Fontana.’ His portrait is the frontispiece of volume iii., which was edited from page 186 by Mr. John Green Waller.

A list of ‘Isle of Wight Words, Superstitions, Sports,’ &c., by Roach Smith and his brother, Major Henry Smith, R.M., was published by the English Dialect Society as part xxiii. (series C. original glossaries).

[Men of the Time, 12th ed.; Athenæum, 9 Aug. 1890, p. 202; Isle of Wight County Press, 2 Aug. 1890; Times, 14 Aug. 1890, p. 9; Proc. Soc. of Antiquaries, 1889–91, pp. 310–12; Portraits of Men of Eminence, vol. v. ed. Walford, pp. 13–15; Proc. of Numismatic Soc. in Numismatic Chronicle, x. 39, xi. 18–21; Journ. Brit. Archæol. Assoc. xlvi. preface, pp. 237–43, 318–330.]

W. P. C.

SMITH, CHARLOTTE (1749–1806), poetess and novelist, the eldest daughter of Nicholas Turner of Stoke House, Surrey, and Bignor Park, Sussex, by his wife, Anna Towers, was born in London on 4 May 1749 at King Street, St. James's. When Charlotte was little more than three years old her mother died, and the child was brought up by an aunt, who sent her at the early age of six to a school at Chichester, and afterwards to another at Kensington. The education thus received was exceedingly superficial, and ceased entirely at the age of twelve, when Charlotte entered society. Two years later she received an offer of marriage, which was refused by her father on the score of her youth. In 1764 the father married a second wife, a woman of fortune. Charlotte's aunt at that time had an aversion to stepmothers, and hurriedly arranged a marriage for her niece with Benjamin Smith, second son of Richard Smith, a West India merchant, and director of the East India Company. The wedding took place on 23 Feb. 1765. The youthful couple (the husband was only twenty-one) lived over the elder Smith's house of business in the city of London, and Charlotte was in enforced attendance on an invalid mother-in-law of exacting disposition. The marriage was not one of affection; both parties had been talked into it by offi-