was knighted 17 Feb. 1549, and was appointed with others a muster-master of the queen's army and a commissioner for the marches of Wales in 1553. He was M.P. for East Grinstead 1553, and for Arundel 1554, and on 8 Feb. 1557–8 he was joined with Sir Thomas Pope [q. v.] and others in a commission then issued for the suppression of heresy (Burnet, Reformation, ii. 536, v. 469).
Stradling was a staunch Roman catholic, and was arrested early in 1561 on the charge that in 1560 he had caused four pictures to be made of the likeness of a cross as it appeared in the grain of a tree blown down in his park at St. Donat's. He was released, after he had been kept ‘of a long time’ a prisoner in the Tower, on his giving a bond for a thousand marks, dated 15 Oct. 1563, for his personal appearance when called upon (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1547–80, p. 176, Addenda, 1547–65, pp. 510, 512; Froude, Hist. vii. 339; Nicholas Harpsfield, Dialogi Sex, Antwerp, 1566, 4to, pp. 504 et seq.; cf. Archæologia Cambrensis, 3rd ser. xi. 33–48; and Clark, Castle of St. Donat's, pp. 14–17). In 1569 Stradling refused to subscribe the declaration for observance of the Act of Uniformity, pleading that his bond was a sufficient guarantee of his conformity (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1547–80, p. 361). He died in 1571, and was buried in the private chapel added by him to the parish church of St. Donat's. His will, dated 19 Dec. 1566, was proved in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury in May 1571.
By his wife Catherine, eldest daughter of Sir Thomas Gamage of Coity, Glamorganshire, Stradling had, besides other children, Edward [q. v.] and a daughter Damascin, who died in the spring of 1567 at Cafra in Spain, whither she had gone as companion to Jane Dormer, duchess of Feria [q. v.] (Stradling Correspondence, pp. 342–7; Sir J. Stradling, Epigrams, p. 25).
[In addition to the authorities cited, see Wood's Athenæ Oxon. ed. Bliss, ii. 50 n.; Collins's Baronetage, ed. 1720, pp. 32–4, which is followed in G. T. Clark's Limbus Patrum Morganiæ, p. 436; Taliesin Williams's Doom of Colyn Dolphyn. For genealogical particulars of the earlier Stradlings, see also the manuscript collections of Glamorgan pedigrees at the Cardiff Free Library, including an autograph volume by John Aubrey in which the Stradling coat of arms is emblazoned.]
STRAFFORD, Earls of. [See Wentworth, Thomas, 1593-1641; Wentworth, Thomas, 1674?-1739; Byng, Sir John, 1772-1860.]
STRAHAN, WILLIAM (1715–1785), printer and publisher, was born in April 1715 at Edinburgh, where his father, Alexander Strahan, had a small post in the customs. After serving an apprenticeship in Edinburgh as a journeyman printer, he ‘took the high road to England’ and found a place in a London firm, probably that of Andrew Millar [q. v.] He married, 20 July 1738, Margaret Penelope, daughter of William Elphinston, an episcopalian clergyman of Edinburgh, and sister of James Elphinston [q. v.] About 1739 he was admitted a junior partner of Millar, with whom he was responsible for the production of Johnson's ‘Dictionary,’ and upon his death in 1768 he continued in partnership with Thomas Cadell the elder [q. v.] In 1769 he was able to purchase from George Eyre a share of the patent as king's printer, and immediately afterwards, in February 1770, the king's printing-house was removed from Blackfriars to New Street, near Gough Square, Fleet Street. Strahan was progressively prosperous, and his dealings with his authors were marked by more amenity than had hitherto characterised such relations. Dr. Thomas Somerville (1741–1830) [q. v.] went to dine with him in New Street in 1769, and met at his house David Hume, Sir John Pringle, Benjamin Franklin, and Mrs. Thrale. The publisher recommended him to stay in London, and gave him 300l. for his ‘History of William III.’ Besides Hume, Strahan was publisher, and either banker and agent or confidential adviser, to Adam Smith, Dr. Johnson, Gibbon, Robertson, Blackstone, Blair, and many other writers. In the case of Gibbon's ‘Decline and Fall,’ which had been refused elsewhere, when Gibbon and Cadell thought that five hundred would probably be enough for a first impression, ‘the number was doubled by the prophetic taste of Mr. Strahan.’ Other notable ventures of the firm were Cook's ‘Voyages’ and Mackenzie's ‘Man of Feeling.’ Strahan made large sums out of the histories of Robertson and Hume, and set up a coach, which Johnson denominated ‘a credit to literature.’
At Strahan's house the unsuccessful meeting between Dr. Johnson and Adam Smith took place. In 1776 Adam Smith addressed to Strahan the famous ‘Letter,’ dated 9 Dec., in which he describes the death of David Hume ‘in such a happy composure of mind that nothing could exceed it,’ and which provoked a long reverberation of angry criticisms. Strahan was Hume's literary executor, and on 26 Nov. 1776 he wrote to Adam Smith proposing that the series of
