WILLIAM COBBETT

9 March 1763

– 18 June 1835

Painting possibly by George Cooke.

Oil on canvas, circa 1831

©National Portrait Gallery

‘View of Mr Cobbett’s House, Botley, Hants’.

Published in 1817

The print may have been made to assist with the finding of a buyer for the house, as by 1817 Cobbett was in financial difficulties and contemplating the disposal of his property. Cobbett had made substantial alterations to the house, including the addition of a portico and the erection of eight feet-high walls around the grounds. His daughter Eleanor refers to the print in a letter she wrote in 1897 saying that it did not show accurately the house she had known as a child. Nonetheless the print gives some idea of how the house would have appeared. Locally, it was nicknamed 'the lantern house’ on account of its many windows.

Hampshire Record Office, To p37/2/2

The William Cobbett Society was founded in 1976 to bring together those who have an interest in the life and writings of William Cobbett. A passionate defender of the freedom of the press Cobbett was prepared to defend it at the cost of imprisonment and exile.

'He is not only unquestionably the most powerful political writer of the present day, but one of the best writers in the language. He speaks and thinks plain, broad, downright English'.  The only time I ever saw him he seemed to me a very pleasant man: easy of access, affable, clear-headed, deliberate and unruffled in his speach... I certainly did not think less favourably of him for seeing him.

Hazlitt's Essay on Cobbett, published in his table talk,1821

The Society’s Activities:

Among the Society's activities are:

An Annual Rural Ride

A day expedition by coach, retracing with readings and commentaries, routes taken by Cobbett on his Rural Rides.

This Year’s Rural Ride will be on  Sunday, 14 July Manor Farm, Botley, Cobbett Trail, for Members of the William Cobbett Society only

(Click for information on 2013 Rural Ride)

An Annual Memorial Lecture

Friday 11 October  by the celebrated BBC journalist Michael Buerk in The Maltings Great Hall, Tickets £8 from the Farnham Maltings Box Office.

Starts 7.00 pm. Bars open

An annual Cobbett walk

visiting the places in Surrey, Sussex and Hampshire where Cobbett lived from 1805 to 1820.

Thur 11 April   Farnham Ramblers: A Cobbett Ramble. 10.15 start from Lions Mouth Car Park. Explorer Map 145 Map Ref: 888411, 6.5 miles. Bring lunch.

The annual publication of a journal, Cobbett's New Register

containing articles on various aspects of Cobbett's life and times, including the text of the Annual Memorial Lecture.

An Annual General Meeting with speaker, Saturday 23 February.

See 250th  Anniversary Events List for 2013 (Click)

Cobbett’s  Works

In association with the Society, the Museum of Farnham holds in its Reading Room an almost complete set of  bound volumes of Cobbett's Political Register and a large collection of Cobbett's works, and books about Cobbett. Various Cobbett artefacts are on display.

Sale of Books (See Books for sale)

Farnham public Art Trust:   http://www.farnhampublicarttrust.co.uk

WILLIAM COBBETT  c1830

By courtesy of the

Museum of Farnham

See Penny Young interview video on Youtube