An Address delivered November 15, 1894, on the occasion of the Gibbon Centenary Commemoration

Abstract

Mr. Frederic Harrison, V.P.R.Hist. S., said:It is now just one hundred years ago that, in a remote village church under Ashdown Forest in Sussex, and in the most simple manner, were laid to rest, by the loving care of his lifelongfriend, the mortal remains of the most famous writer of history in the English language. Edward Gibbon, the immortal author of ‘The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire’, died in London in January 1794, at the age of 56, after an illness of a few days, almost in the fulnessof his intellectual power, at the zenith of his fame, with the great work of his life achieved, in perfect peace of mind, and surrounded by the esteem and affection of all who knew him. Hisdear friend, we may almost say his brother by adoption, Lord Sheffield, whose grandson to-day presides over this gathering, placed the body in the Sheffield mausoleum in Fletching Church, where it still reposes; and he collected in the house of Sheffield Place portraits, miniatures, personal relics, manuscripts, diaries, and letters of the historian; and there, until now, they have been religiously preserved as heirlooms in the Sheffield family. Nor have the literary remains ever been examined since the publication of Lord Sheffield's five volumes of ‘Miscellaneous Works’ in 1814, except partially by Dean Milman more than fifty years ago.