motion, those who had signed were impeached as guilty of high treason by endeavouring to subvert the fundamental laws of the kingdom and the very being of parliament, and on the last day of the year Towers and nine others were lodged in the Tower. After about four months he was released, retired to Peterborough, and thence to Oxford, where he remained till its surrender in 1646. He then returned to Peterborough, where he died in obscurity on 10 Jan. 1648-9. He was buried in the cathedral. Besides a daughter Spencer, who married Robert Pykarell, rector of Burgate in Suffolk, and died on 16 Feb. 1657–8, he had a son William, noticed below.
Towers was the author of 'Four Sermons,' London, 1660, 8vo, edited by his son.
His son, William Towers (1617?–1666), prebendary of Peterborough, born in 1616 or 1617, was educated at Westminster school as a king's scholar. He matriculated from Christ Church, Oxford, on 1 Sept. 1634, graduating B.A. on 11 April 1638, M.A. on 22 May 1641, and B.D., on 17 June 1646. He was installed a prebendary of Peterborough on 20 April 1641, and in 1644 was presented to the rectory of Barnack in Northamptonshire. The successes of the parliamentary troops drove him to take refuge in Oxford, and on the capitulation of the city he was driven to serve a curacy at Upton, near Northampton. In 1660, through the friendship of Mountjoy Blount, earl of Newport [q.v.], he was reinstated in his preferments, and appointed rector of Fiskerton, near Lincoln. He died on 20 Oct. 1666, while on a visit to Uffington in Lincolnshire, and was buried in the chancel of the church there.
He was the author of: 1. 'Atheismus Vapulans,' London, 1654, 8vo. 2. 'Polytheismus Vapulans,' London, 1654, 8vo. 3. 'A Sermon against Murder, by occasion of the Romanists putting the Protestants to Death in the Dukedome of Savoy,' London, 1655, 4to. 4. 'Obedience perpetually due to Kings,' London, 1660, 4to (Wood, Athenae Oxon. ed. Bliss, iii. 736; Willis, Cathedral Survey, ii. 521; Walker, Sufferings of the Clergy, ii. 61; Welch, Alumni Westmon. p. 107; Foster, Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714).
[Wood's Fasti Oxon. ed. Bliss, i. 344; Fuller's Worthies, ed. Nichols, 1811, ii. 127; Notes and Queries, 1st ser. xii. 233; Britton's Hist. and Antiquities of Peterborough Cathedral, p. 35; Lloyd's Memoires, 1668, p. 601; Lansdowne MS. 985, ff. 127–30; British Museum Addit. MSS. 5882, f. 89; Bridges's Hist. of Northamptonshire, ed. Whalley, i. 346, 398, ii. 502, 560, 563; Laud's Works, passim.]
TOWERS, JOSEPH (1737–1799), biographer, was born in Southwark on 31 March 1737. His father was a second-hand bookseller, and at twelve years old he was employed as a stationer's errand boy. In 1754 he was apprenticed to Robert Goadby [q.v.] at Sherborne, Dorset. Here he learned Latin and Greek. Goadby made him an Arian. Coming to London in 1764, he worked as a journeyman printer, began to write political pamphlets, and set up a bookseller's shop in Fore Street about 1765. Goadby employed him as editor of the ‘British Biography’ (from the date of Wycliffe), and the first seven volumes, 1766–1772, 8vo, were compiled by him, on the basis of the ‘Biographia Britannica,’ 1747–1766, fol., but containing much original work, the fruit of research at the British Museum.
In 1774 he gave up business, was ordained as a dissenting minister, and became pastor of the presbyterian congregation in Southwood Lane, Highgate. He became associated with Andrew Kippis [q.v.] in the new edition of the ‘Biographia Britannica,’ 1778–93, fol., where his contributions are signed ‘T.’ The opening of a rival meeting-house in Southwood Lane (1778) had drawn away many of his hearers. Towers left Highgate to become (1778) forenoon preacher at Stoke Newington Green, as coadjutor to Richard Price (1723–1791) [q.v.] On 19 Nov. 1779 he received the diploma of LL.D. from Edinburgh University. He continued to write pamphlets, of which a collection was published by subscription, 1796, 8vo, 3 vols. His chief separate work was ‘Memoirs … of Frederick the Third … of Prussia,’ 1788, 8vo, 2 vols. He was a trustee of Dr. Williams's foundations, 1790–99. He died on 20 May 1799. He was married to a relative of Caleb Fleming [q.v.] His portrait, painted by Samuel Drummond [q.v.], was engraved by Farn.
Joseph Lomas Towers (1767?–1831), his only son, born about 1767, was educated at St. Paul's school and New College, Hackney (entered September 1768); he preached as a unitarian minister without charge, and in 1792 succeeded Roger Flexman [q.v.] as librarian of Dr. Williams's library; resigning this post in 1804, he led an eccentric life, busy with literary schemes, and collecting books and prints. He became insane in 1830, and died on 4 Oct. 1831, at the White House, Bethnal Green; he was buried in a vault at Elim Chapel, Fetter Lane. He published: 1. ‘Illustrations of Prophecy,’ 1796, 8vo, 2 vols. (anon.). 2. ‘The
