CHAPTER I MANCHESTER BEGINNINGS, 1783-1791 DURING Thomas Cooper's old age in South Carolina one of his admirers claimed, with greater enthusiasm than accuracy, that he was famous on two continents. By that time England had doubtless forgotten him and he did not lack for critics to assert that even in America he had gained not fame, but infamous notoriety. In his native land he was never famous and was only temporarily notorious. England relinquished without protest this immature philosopher of revolution and unsuccessful advocate of reform, and it is improbable that even his more notable American exploits as Republican agitator and pioneer of nullification and secession aroused much interest among his former countrymen. Of his career as judge, scientist, educator, religious controversialist, and universal scholar, they knew little and probably cared to know nothing more. Englishmen have been even more indifferent to his early than to his later life. They have not pried into obscure local records to ascertain the sources of his greatness, nor sought to recall anecdotes indicative of budding genius. Although he himself was fully aware of his public significance, he seems to have regarded the personal background of his life as unimportant. Fugitive and incidental references to his career in England are to be found in his later writings, but these are almost silent in regard to his personal life before he became a public figure. The story of his early years must be pieced out with fragments. He was born in Westminster, October 22, 1759, the son of Thomas Cooper, who was entitled to bear heraldic arms and seems to have been a man of means.1 The family fortunes permitted of the son's being sent to Oxford, and he was able subsequently to make large investment in an industrial enterprise in Lancashire. During most of his life in England he seems to have felt free to devote himself largely to scientific and intellectual pursuits and to the public weal, without serious concern about finances; and later references to a once-adequate fortune, which we know was largely lost at Manchester, indicate that until disaster met his firm he occupied a position of financial independence. He doubtless gained something by his exertions as a barrister and manufacturer and is said to have acquired a considerable fortune by his first marriage, but he probably got something besides his name from his father. 2 In February, 1779, at the age of nineteen, he was matriculated at Oxford from University College, where he seems to have been in residence earlier. He never took a degree from the university, although from a statement made by him many years later we are led to conclude that he took the necessary examinations, which he described as easy. According to the family tradition he 3 1 Jos. Foster, Alumni Oxoniensis, 1715-1886, I, 294. By far the best account of Cooper's life in England which has yet appeared in print is H. M. Ellis's "Thomas Cooper-A Survey of His Life," South Atlantic Quarterly, XIX, 24-42. The collection of letters from Cooper's descendants made by the late Colyer Meriwether and preserved in the library of the University of South Carolina is the best source as regards family traditions. For incidental references in Cooper's own writings which indicate a relatively high economic and social position during his youth, see Emporium of Arts and Sciences, new series, II, 402, and Port Folio, 4 series, I, 397-8. 2 Cf. Philadelphia Aurora, April 25, 1800. 3Letter to a Friend on University Education," Sept. 15, 1814, Port refused to sign the Thirty-Nine Articles, which we can well believe. A later sympathetic commentator upon the career of a fellow free-thinker may have reflected his own feelings when he suggested that Cooper, like Shelley, must have found "the dry, inquisitive, pedantic despotism of Oxford intolerable." Such may well have been the case, especially since there was no apparent aesthetic compensation. The physical charms of the city of colleges seem to have left no impress upon a nature which was largely devoid of aesthetic appreciation. His protest, whether explicit or implicit, must have been that of the utilitarian, not that of the romanticist. Either while at Oxford or before he went there he gained a thorough grounding in the classics which, despite his scientific bent and utilitarian philosophy, he always emphasized as of fundamental importance in education. It was perhaps while he was at Oxford, however, that the interest in science which was to remain with him throughout life was first aroused. It is said that he wished to become a physician and studied law only because of his father's persuasion. During the hot summer of 1780 he attended anatomical lectures in London, and he afterwards took a clinical course at the Middlesex Folio, 3 series, V, 352. If he was speaking with strict accuracy when he said he passed "five and thirty years ago," this must have been in 1779. He was married August 12, 1779, so one would assume that he took the examinations before that time, although it is not impossible that he may have remained in residence after his marriage. The statutes did not forbid. He spoke elsewhere of the long vacation of 1780, Emporium, new series, II, 430. There is no certainty that he remembered his dates accurately and the whole matter is confused. The records of the college give no further information. 4"Dr. Thomas Cooper," London Reasoner and Theological Examiner, IX, 242; an article written in 1850, doubtless by one of the editors of this organ of free-thinkers. 5 See his "Letter to a Friend on University Education," Port Folio, 3 series, V, 349-59; and numerous references in letters to Jefferson about the University of Virginia and in addresses as president of South Carolina College. |