Joseph Gillow
English Roman Catholic antiquary, historian and bio-bibliographer
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Joseph Gillow (5 October 1850, Preston, Lancashire – 17 March 1921, Westholme, Hale, Cheshire) was an English Roman Catholic antiquary, historian and bio-bibliographer, "the Plutarch of the English Catholics".[1]
Biography
Born in Frenchwood House, Lancashire,[2] to a recusant English Roman Catholic family able to trace an uninterrupted pedigree back to Conishead Priory in 1325, Gillow was the son of a magistrate, Joseph Gillow (1801–1872), and his wife, Jane Haydock (1805–1872), a descendant of Christopher Haydock, a Lancashire politician and a member of another prominent recusant English Roman Catholic family, the Haydocks of Cottam.[2][3]
Joseph Gillow was educated at Sedgley Park School, Wolverhampton (1862–1863) and St Cuthbert's College, Ushaw (1864–1866), where his brothers and uncles had studied for the priesthood.[4] At Ushaw, Gillow developed an abiding interest in Lancashire Catholicism, resulting in the publication of The Tyldesley Diary in 1873.[2]
In 1878 Gillow married Eleanor McKenna, daughter of John McKenna, of Dunham Massey Hall,[2] with whom he had seven children.[5] In marrying into the McKennas, Gillow secured himself a private income which allowed him to pursue his antiquarian interests.[6]
Cardinal Gasquet described the dictionary as a ‘veritable storehouse of information’, however, until 1986, no index was available.[7]
Gillow was appointed honorary recorder of the Catholic Record Society at its foundation in 1904, and was a frequent contributor.[8]
Works
- A Literary and Biographical History, or Bibliographical Dictionary, of the English Catholics, from the Breach with Rome, in 1534, to the Present Time, New York: Catholic Publication Society, 1885.
- The Tyldseley Diary (editor)
- The Haydock Papers: A Glimpse Into English Catholic Life Under the Shade of Persecution and in the Dawn of Freedom, New York: Burns & Oates, 1888.
- St. Thomas's Priory, or, The story of St. Austin's Stafford, London: Burns & Oates, 1894.
- Lancashire Recusants
- 'Lord Burghley's Map of Lancashire', Miscellanea of the Catholic Record Society, 4 (London, 1907), pp. 162–216 and frontispiece
- A Catalogue of the Martyrs in Englande for Profession of the Catholique Faith since the yeare of Our Lord 1535[9]
