The two Revd John Atkinsons from Goldhanger

There were two Revd John Atkinsons who lived in Goldhanger. The Revd John Atkinson senior (1787-1828) was a Goldhanger curate and a recognised ornithologist in his day. His father was the Revd Chistopher Atkinson. A short biography of him is included at the beginning of Miller Christy's Birds of Essex, published in 1890...

The son of Revd John Atkinson senior, the Revd John Christopher Atkinson (1814-1900), was born in Goldhanger and spent his younger days here and in Essex and is perhaps the most well known member of the family. His achievements are described further down this page.

these notes have been found in volumes of the Zoologist journal...

The following words appeared in The early history of the Church Missionary Society for Africa and the East written by Charles Hole in 1814, which suggest he was involved with missionary societies and moved to Wethersfield the year his son was born...

Confusingly, a person by the name of John Atkinson with the same birth and death dates (1787-1828) wrote: "Ornithology, with a reference to the anatomy and physiology of birds" published in 1820, however this author is listed as "a member of the Royal College of Surgeons" and was born and died in Leeds, so it would seem to be an incredible coincidence, but he was most likely to have been a member of the same family.

The following is taken from Natural History Biographies at... http://www.natstand.org.uk/time/AtkinsonJCtime.htm

The Rev. John Christopher Atkinson was born in Goldhanger, Essex, the eldest child of Rev. John Atkinson who was curate in the parish. His father was a keen bird-watcher and sportsman and his grandfather, Christopher Atkinson, was a talented amateur bird illustrator. John Christopher spent his early years in Essex where he devoted much of his time to the study of local birds. He was a cousin of the Newnham brothers of Farnham, botanists Rev William Orde Newnham and Dr Christopher Atkinson Newnham and lepidopterist Rev Philip Hankinson Newnham.

This website also links to a family tree at... http://www.natstand.org.uk/pdf/AtkinsonJC000.pdf

Futher investigations into the history of the Revd Atkinsons of Goldganger has led to the conclusion that there were at least six directly related clerics in that family with very similar names, making it difficult to identify their individual achievements. They all had very large families:

Revd Christopher Atkinson, 1713-1774, vicar of Thorp Arch near Wetherby , 12 children

Revd Christopher Atkinson, 1773-1843, vicar of Elland near Halifax, Yorkshire for 41 years, 7 children

Revd Christopher Atkinson, 1755-1795, tutor Trinity College well know ornithological artist, father of the Goldhanger curate 6 children

Revd John Atkinson, 1787-1828, Goldhanger curate, also a recognised ornithologist, 8 children

Revd John Atkinson, 1803-1839, vicar of Elland, near Halifax, Yorkshire

Revd John Christopher Atkinson, 1814-1900, born at Goldhanger, ornithologist, and antiquary author, 13 children

There were also several other clerics in the family with other Christian names. There is more about the Atkinson clerics in...

http://www.calderdalecompanion.co.uk/mma26.html ..."Families with the surname Atkinson”

Here is a short extract about the Revd Christopher Atkinson, who was a tutor at Trinity College Cambridge...

Here are some samples of the Revd Christopher Atkinson artwork...

Two bound albums of his original watercolour drawings, entitled English Birds sold in the past for £24,000

The Revd John Christopher Atkinson (1814-1900), son of the Goldhanger Curate, was born in Goldhanger, and is undoubtedly the best known member of this family dynasty of clerics, ornithologists and authors...

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The Revd John Christopher Atkinson

John Christopher Atkinson (1814 - 1900), was born on 9 May 1814 at Goldhanger, and was the son of the Revd John Atkinson, Goldhanger curate, and his wife, Martha, daughter of Richard Causten of Mundon Hall. J C Atkinson would have initially attended the village school which was either in the parochial Dame School in the Rectory or in the Pit Cottages at that time, as the village school as we know it today wasn’t built until 1875. Later he was educated at a Kelvedon boarding school, and then was a sizar to St John's College, Cambridge. On 2 May 1834; he graduated BA in 1838. He was ordained deacon in 1841 as curate of Brockhampton in Herefordshire, and a priest in 1842. He became the rector of Danby in the North Riding of Yorkshire until his death in 1900.

The Revd Atkinson was an energetic antiquary of wide interests who, in addition to his historical work, published works on folklore, ornithology, and dialect studies, as well as writing books for children. In 1872 he embarked on a History of Cleveland, which remained unfinished, but was reconstructed from his surviving notes and published in 1982. He also excavated between 80 and 100 barrows in Cleveland. His interest in barrows undoubtedly started in his youth when he live at Goldhanger.

His most famous work, Forty Years in a Moorland Parish (1891) is a mine of historical information and a classic account of a rural ministry in Victorian England and has been reprinted several times. In 1887 he received the honorary degree from Durham University, and in 1891 he was installed in the “prebend of Holme” in York Minster.

These three paragraphs written by Miller Christy about Revd J.C. Atkinson in 1890 in his book Birds of Essex, are of particular local interest...

. . .The days of his boyhood were spent in the district around Goldhanger, Great Wigborough, Little Wigborough, Peldon, Tollesbury, Mersea, &c., and he thus had unrivalled facilities for becoming intimately acquainted with the birds frequenting that part of the Essex coast, opportunities of which he made excellent use. He also resided in, or by means of visits became familiar with, Bardfield, Finchingfield, Gosfield, Colchester, Maldon, and other parts of Essex. Many notes of his on the ornithology of our coast may be found in the early volumes of the Zoologist. In short, the first twenty-four years of Mr. Atkinson's life, allowing for university residence, were spent in Essex.

He has written numerous popular works on Natural History, including: The Nests and Eggs of British Birds , a charming little book, which has gone through several editions, and is still one of the most popular works on ornithology in the English language; few, if any, books have in their day done more to popularise that science. A threepenny edition of it appeared in 1885. It contains numerous reminiscences of his early days, spent among the birds on the Essex saltings.

The town of Elmdon, described in Walks and Talks possesses considerable local interest for Essex people, although it has no connection with the Essex village of that name. In writing the book, Mr. Atkinson says in a letter to me: "I drew largely on my recollections of Kelvedon and of my school life and exploits there, and some of the scenery and places described, such as Docwra's Mill, Watery Lane, and the Stream, certainly had a Kelvedon origin, as also had the twelve daily coaches up to London, the flocks of geese along the roads, the school ghost, the coaches full, inside and out, a little before Christmas, with game, turkeys, &c., and many other scenes and incidents all through the book; but the moorland, and all that pertains thereto - water-ouzels, trout-fishing, golden plover's nests, and the like - have no connection whatever with Kelvedon." Chapter XIX, too, contains a graphic account of a walk on the Essex Marshes, and of a day's wild-fowl shooting on the Main, round the Wigboroughs and Mersea . .

The full biography can be read in Birds of Essex at... http://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/50449#page/22

There is a Wikipedia page about him at...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Christopher_Atkinson

and a Dictionary of National Biography entry at...

Dictionary_of_National_Biography,_1901_supplement/Atkinson,_John_Christopher

Revd J C Atkinson published several books and many documents while living and working in Yorkshire, however some of his books, (marked with * below), have strong Goldhanger and Essex Coast connections...

1859 The Walks, Talks, Travels, and Exploits of two Schoolboys *

1860 Play-hours and Half-holidays; or, Further Experiences of two Schoolboys *

1861 Sketches in Natural History; with an Essay on Reason and Instinct *

1861 British Birds' Eggs and Nests popularly described *

1864 Stanton Grange; or at a Private Tutor's * (very little found about this book- see this note)

1868 Garden of Sorrows

1868 A Glossary of the Cleveland Dialect

1870 Lost; or What came of a Slip from "Honour Bright"

1872 The History of Cleveland, Ancient and Modern

1891 The Last of the Giant Killers, or The exploits of Sir Jack of Danby Dale (no drawings included)

1891 Forty Years in a Moorland Parish

1892 Scenes in Fairy-land