Brewer's: Great Men

(Social status of). ÆSOP, a manumitted slave.

ARKWRIGHT (Sir Richard), a barber.

BEACONSFIELD (Lord), a solicitor's clerk.

BLOOMFIELD, a cobbler, son of a tailor.

BUNYAN, a travelling tinker.

BURNS, a gauger, son of a ploughman.

CÆDMON, a cowherd.

CERVANTES, a common soldier.

CLARE, a ploughman, son of a farm labourer.

CLAUDE LORRAINE, a pastrycook.

COLUMBUS, son of a weaver.

COOK (Captain), son of a husbandman.

CROMWELL, son of a brewer.

CUNNINGHAM (Allan), a stonemason, son of a peasant.

DEFOE, a hosier, son of a butcher.

DEMOSTHENES, son of a cutler.

DICKENS, a, newspaper reporter; father the same.

ELDON (Lord ), son of a coal-broker.

FARADAY (Michael), a bookbinder.

FERGUSON (James), the astronomer, son of a day-labourer.

FRANKLIN, a journeyman printer, son of a tallow-chandler.

HARGREAVES, the machinist, a poor weaver.

HOGG, a shepherd, son of a Scotch peasant.

HOMER, a farmer's son (said to have begged his bread).

HORACE, son of a manumitted slave.

HOWARD (John), a grocer's apprentice, son of a tradesman.

KEAN (Edmund), son of a stage-carpenter in a minor theatre.

JONSON (Ben), a bricklayer.

LATIMER, Bishop of Worcester, son of a small farmer.

LUCIAN, a sculptor, son of a poor tradesman.

MONK (General), a volunteer.

OPIE (John), son of a poor carpenter in Cornwall.

PAINE (Thomas), a stay-maker, son of a Quaker.

PORSON (Richard), son of a parish clerk in Norfolk.

RICHARDSON, a bookseller and printer, son of a joiner.

SHAKESPEARE, son of a wool-stapler.

STEPHENSON (George), son of a fireman at a colliery.

VIRGIL, son of a porter.

WATT (James), improver of the steam engine, son of a block-maker.

WASHINGTON, a farmer.

WOLSEY, son of a butcher.

And hundreds more.

Great Men

(Wives of). (See under Wives.)

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
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