LIFE OF ALBANY HANCOCK.* 



JOSHCTA ALDER died in January, 1867, at the age of seventy- 

 four years ; Albany Hancock in October, 1873, at the age of 

 sixty-seven years. 



The linked names of Alder and Hancock, friends and 

 fellow-workers for many years, will long be esteemed as those 

 of good and true men, who, from a pui'e and unselfish love of 

 science, have done much towards enlarging the boundaries of 

 Natural History, and have shed a lustre on the town in which 

 they were born and spent their lives. Both were self-taught 

 men in their departments of scientific work, and have shown 

 what talent and perseverance can effect without the aid of 

 academic training. The same may be said in the case of 

 many others of our distinguished men of the North of England. 



In a memoir of the lives of men distinguished in any walk 

 of life, or who have left their mark on any department of 

 science, it is always interesting to know their origin, who and 

 what their parents were, under whose auspices they were 

 brought up, and whether or not their talents were hereditary. 



Nothing is now known of the Hancock family before the 

 time of Albany's grandfather, about the middle of the 18th 

 century. His grandmother, whose maiden name was Baker, 

 was, by the maternal side, a Henzell; a member of the family 

 of that name, who, with the Tyzacks and Tytterys, brought 

 to the Tyne and Wear, and also to Staffordshire, towards the 

 end of the sixteenth century, the important art of glass- 

 making. 



Thomas Hancock, Albany's grandfather, was a saddler and 

 ironmonger, at the north end of Tyne Bridge, before the year 

 1771. He had two sons, John and Henry. John, the elder, 

 and the father of Albany, was sent to school at Redrnire, in 

 Yorkshire, under the Eev. T. Hislop, a clergyman of the 

 Church of England. He showed much ability, and on leav- 

 ing school joined his father in business. This he pursued 



* Extracted, by permission of the Council of the Natiiral History Society 

 of Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne, from the 'Nat. Hist. 

 Trans, of Northumberland and Durham,' Vol. V, pp. 118-13-4 (1877), with a 

 few omissions. 



II. b 



