Henry Virtue Tebbs

London solicitor, proctor and notary who acted as trustee of the compensation money awarded to Mary Johnson, the widow of Godscall Johnson, for enslaved people on the Holly and Savanna estates in Antigua, and who bought for £1000 the entitlement to compensation of Catherine Carter formally Hayne (q.v.) for the enslaved people on Haddons in Jamaica.

1. Baptised 31/05/1797 at St Luke's Chelsea, son of William and Mary Tebbs. Married firstly, Caroline Nailer, 19/09/1823, with whom he had a daughter, Caroline Mary, baptised 09/08/1824 in St Luke Chelsea. Married secondly, Emma Haslope 05/08/1830 at St Mary Islington. In 1851 Henry V. Tebbs aged 44 'Proctor' was living in Cheyne Row with wife Emma aged 30 and children Emily aged 10, Julia aged 6, Ann aged 4 and 'NK' aged 1 day. In 1871 Henry V. Tebbs aged 73, 'Property', born Chelsea was living at Tormonham in Torquay as a boarder with his wife Emma aged 62 and daughter Julia M aged 32. Death of Henry Virtue Tebbs registered Q4 1876 at Clifton Gloucestershire aged 79. Will of Henry Virtue Tebbs of Doctors Commons in the City of London and Southwood Hall Highgate but late of Hillside, Henbury Gloucestershire who died 26/11/1876 proved 05/01/1877 by widow Emma and sons Henry Virtue Tebbs and Stephen Nottidge Tebbs, effects under £50,000.  

2. The Henry Virtue Tebbs who was a friend of Dante Gabriel Rossetti was the son of Henry Virtue Tebbs (1797-1876) of this entry. The life-dates of the younger man were 1833-1899: his library was sold in 1900. His father Henry Virtue Tebbs (1797-1876) had inherited the books and MS of Elizabeth Denyer not specifically left by her in 1824 to the British Museum, Bodleian and Church Missionary Society: these books have not been traced but might have formed part of the 1900 sale by the son.

3. Henry Virtue Tebbs (1797-1876) was the author of 'Essay on the Scripture Doctrines of Adultery and Divorce, and on the Criminal Character and Punishment of Adultery' (London: F.C. And J. Rivington, 1822).    

T71/877 Antigua claim no. 387 (Holly & Savanna); T71/1606: letter from Bridges & Mason dated 10/06/1836 stating that by an indenture of 12/10/1835 Catherine the wife of Wm Carter of Worthing in the county of Suffolk [sic] gentleman sold in consideration for £1000 to Henry Vertue [sic] Tebbs of Doctors commons all monies which might become payable by way or in nature of compensation in respect of a certain annuity of £500 a year and the arreas thereon. Catherine Carter had launched suit in Jamaica v Joseph Hayne the younger, proprietor of the estate, to force payment, and Hamilton Brown was receiver in that case.

1. Ancestry.com, London, England, Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1538-1812 [database online]; Ancestry.com, London, England, Marriages and Banns, 1754-1921 [database online]; Ancestry.com, London, England, Births and Baptisms, 1813-1906 [database online]; 1851 and 1871 censuses online; FreeUKGen, England and Wales Free BMD Database, Deaths, 1837-1983 [database online]; National Probate Calendar 1877.

2. E.g. The H.V. Tebbs Collection of Pre-Raphaelite Photographs 1866-1897, Princeton University Library http://findingaids.princeton.edu/getEad?eadid=C0988&kw= [accessed 05/10/2011]; Catalogue of the Valuable Library of the Late H. Virtue-Tebbs, Esq. Comprising First Editions of the Writings of Matthew Arnold, Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning, W. Morris, Swinburne, Tennyson, Wordsworth... Columna, Hypnerotomachia Polyphili, Aldus 1499, and Other Early Printed Books ... Which Will Be Sold by Auction, by Messrs. Sotheby, Wilkinson and Hodge ... on Monday the 25th Day of June, 1900 and Following Day (London: Dryden, 1900); Sonja Drimmer, 'A Medieval Psalter ‘Perfected’: Eighteenth-Century Conservationism and an Early (Female) Restorer of Rare Books and Manuscripts' https://www.bl.uk/eblj/2013articles/pdf/ebljarticle32013.pdf [accessed 07/09/2017].

3. Available at http://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Essay_on_the_Scripture_doctrines_of_adul.html?id=qfkTAAAAIAAJ&redir_esc=y [accessed 15/01/2013].

We are grateful to Robert Lancashire for his assistance with compiling this entry.