MILLINGCHAMP, BENJAMIN (1756-1829), naval chaplain and collector of Oriental manuscripts;
b. in 1756, the son of Joseph Millingchamp, Comptroller of the Customs at Cardigan, and his wife Anne (Gambold). He was educated at Ystrad Meurig School, Queen's College, Oxford (matriculated 12 Feb. 1773), and Merton College, Oxford (B.A. 1777). Ordained deacon 9 Aug. 1778 by J. Yorke, bishop of S. Davids, he was appointed (4 Sept. 1778) a chaplain on board the ‘Superbe,’ the flagship of admiral Sir Edward Hughes, which sailed for India early in 1779. Then followed eighteen years in foreign service, Millingchamp leaving the fleet in July 1782 to become chaplain at Fort S. George, Madras. At Madras he started to learn Persian, becoming proficient in the language and collecting Persian and other oriental books and manuscripts (in N.L.W. since 1912). He left India finally in 1796, returned to Britain, m. (1798) Sarah Rawlinson of Grantham, and settled at Plas Llangoedmor, near Cardigan. Afterwards he received certain preferments in England and Wales (details in chapter xi of N.L.W. MS. 13737), being, in 1825, appointed to the archdeaconry of Carmarthen. (He had proceeded D.D. at Oxford in 1821). A Sermon preached at St. Peter's Church, Carmarthen, on Thursday, July 4th, 1811, before the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge and Church Union in the Diocese of St. Davids. … By the Rev. Benjamin Millingchamp was published at Carmarthen in 1812. He d. 6 Jan. 1829, and was buried at Llangoedmor.
Bibliography:
- ‘Life and Letters of… Benjamin Millingchamp … by Herbert Millingchamp Vaughan, 1940,’ now N.L.W. MS. 13737, has detailed references to sources;
- Jane Porter, The Two Little Princes of Persia, 1801;
- N.L.W. Cat. of Oriental MSS., 1916;
- H. M. Vaughan, ‘The Millingchamps of Cardigan,’ in W. Wales Hist. Records, v, 104-12;
- [N.L.W. Jnl., ii, 48].
Author:
Sir William Llewelyn Davies, M.A., LL.D., F.S.A. (1887-1952), Aberystwyth
