Obituary of Charles Newby Wawn, d 22 May 1840
To the Rev. John Tyson vicar of Merrington this obituary of our late lamented friend is affectionately inscribed.
Profile etching of Charles Newby Wawn - click image to enlarge
"Away Despair: my gracious Lord doth hear,
Though winds and waves assault my keel,
He doth preserve it: he doth steer,
Ev’n while the boat seems most to real:
Storms are the triumph of his art:
Well may he close his eyes, but not his heart. "
HERBERT
Died on 22nd May 1840, aged 58, CHARLES NEWBY WAWN Esq, late of this town. Mr Wawn for many years practiced with distinguished ability and success, the profession of a Surgeon-Dentist: and at one time spread the influence of his name as a most skilful and talented operator, from York to Edinburgh, and from the German Ocean to the Irish Sea.
His manners were highly polished and refined – his intelligence varied and extensive – his benevolence unsectarian and unbounded – and his whole life regulated by the pure principle of our Holy Religion.
He was eminently skilled in mechanical science and most happy in its application, under a singularly correct judgement, to the relief of suffering humanity. He cultivated music and the languages.
He was extremely conversant with the Hebrew and its cognate tongues, with those of the two polite nations of antiquity and with most of the languages and dialects of modern Europe. He wrote and spoke with great fluency. His style was rather ornate and distinguished by sweeping and accumulated epiphet. Notwithstanding the extent of his practice, his labours in the cause of religion and humanity were untiring and multitudinous. At the period when Mr Wawn ascended the horizon, there were but few men in this part of the country, of his rank and influence, who would submit to the brand of enthusiast and methodist, but with an Apostolical heroism, he gloried in the cross, and to his piety and zeal, we owe, among other kindred institutions, the formation of the Newcastle Bible and Tract Societies, and also the Sunday School Union, and the Auxillary Church and Jewish Missionary Societies.
Like the great Apostle of Methodism, he venerated the memory of the founders – fully appreciated the excellencies of the formularies – and considered himself a true son of the Church of England, whilst at the same time he held membership and office in the Wesleyan body, and general union with the Evangelical Christians of other denominations – but he was a Catholic and an Eclectic in the genuine sense of the terms – and
"In his duty, prompt at every call,
He watched and wept, he prayed and felt for all. "
In short, it seemed to be the business of his life, to soften down religious differences and animosities, and to invite in one bond of brotherhood and affection, the whole family of Christ.
The great medical and surgical charities of the district were indebted him for energetic support. He was anxions (sic) that the seminary which had communicated the elements of knowledge to the martyred Ridley, to Stowell, to Eldon, to Chambers, and to Collingwood, should not remain a bare grammar school; and when Henry Atkinson appeared as a candidate for one of its vacant memberships and had to stem the torrent of prejudice which set in against that mathematical genius, for the part which he had taken in the Don Juan controversy, Mr Wawn raised the barrier of his powerful pen against it; although he had been one of the most formidable of the great man’s opponents, in the struggle respecting the admissibility of Lord Byron’s talented but objectionable work, into the Literary and Philosophical Society of this town, a struggle which, headed by the present learned Master of the Temple, shook that institution to its very centre.
Newcastle Literary & Philosophical Society (2001)
His labours were considerable in that great work of national righteousness the Abolition of Colonial Slavery. He published a series of well written papers under the signature "Eleutheros" on that important subject, which produced a considerable impression on the public mind. His pamphlet on the unfortunate judgement pronounced in the case of the slave Grace, shows the versatility of his genius and the extent of his erudition and excites the most pungent regret that the greatest civilian and colonist which England has provided, and of whom Newcastle may be justly proud, should have given his dying testimony in favour of a principle striking at the liberties of mankind.
"Who would not grieve if such a man there be ?
Who would not mourn if ATTICUS were he ?"
Mr Wawn seldom "travelled out of the record" of religion and humanity, but when he did apply himself to other affairs, he was not a whit behind the ‘very chiefist’ of those engaged in them. He had great discrimination of character, and was early attracted by the intellectual power of a man then in obscure circumstances, but who has since shed a flood of light upon the world, George Stephenson. Mr Wawn espoused his cause in the controversy with Sir Humphrey Davy, and was to a considerable extent, the means of developing the merits of a philosopher, the native force of whose intellect has raised him to an emminence to which no man of the present age can approach, with the solitary exception of our illustrious fellow townsman, Richard Grainger.
The access which Mr Wawn’s professional skill gave him to the wealthy and the influential classes of society was made available to the support of the various religions and benevolent institutions which he had formed or patronised. The largesses which he poured into the treasury from these sources were truly astonishing, and without the aid thus afforded, these works of beneficience and mercy would at that day have come to an end.
Mr Wawn occasionally counted the Muses, and some beautiful poetical effusions are the product of his pen. His writings, which are very numerous, are principally anonymous, and scattered over the reports of the different institutions with which he was connected, and in the monthly and other periodicals of the times. He is, however, favourably known as the writer of an interesting memoir of the late Mr Flanders, the banker, and of Thomas Curry, a pious keelman.
Thus lived and thus laboured the amiable and accomplished subject of this slight tribute to his memory, until a painful disease some years ago threw him out of the glare of public life. A new race of philanthropists have sprung up "who knew not Joseph". But whether the name of Charles Wawn be forgotten or appreciated, a generation of our fellow-citizens have already participated, and are now participating, in the blessings communicated by the institutions which he originated; and the generations yet unborn are destined to enjoy their happy results.
He retired to Tynemouth about two years ago, where he rather suddenly, but in perfect tranquillity of mind, finished his course, at peace with his Maker, through the blood of atonement, and in charity with all mankind.
HAIL AND FAREWELL !
John Fenwick
ADVERTISEMENT
"O, my gentle Hubert,
We owe thee much: within this wall of flesh
There is a soul counts thee her creditor"
When I heard of the death of a friend of my youth and the companion of my riper years, the stream of events which marked his useful and honourable career passed in rapid flight before me, and I gave utterance to the feelings which agitated in the Newcastle Chronicle of the 30th May ult.
It was impossible to concentrate in the breviate of an obituary the biography of a man so pre-eminently distinguished for those talents which adorned, and those virtues which enabled him as one of "the men of the century;" but I laid hold of source of the excellencies of his character and left them to find their way to the respect of his fellow citizens, and the veneration of the Church of God. I rejoice to find that this humble endeavour has not been in vain, and that I am now called on to give it a more permanent form, than could be obtained by the fleeting columns of a newspaper.
I confined myself to the labours of Mr Wawn on this side of the island. Our Cumbrian neighbours may well complain that no mention was made of his name in connexion with their Christian and Benevolent Institutions. I now take the opportunity of stating that Mr Wawn considered himself a citizen of Carlisle, and felt the greatest satisfaction in promoting whatever was calculated to advance the common weal of mankind in that important section of the empire. The late eminent Dean of Carlisle, Dr Isaac Milner, and the Lady Catherine Graham, of Netherby, who aided his philanthropic endeavours, are now numbered with the pious dead ! Delicacy forbids my naming the living worthies who felt it an honour to be associated in the benevolent enterprises of a man who lived not to himself, but for the common good of the species.
I may here be allowed to state that Mr Wawn was very much resorted to for counsel and advice in affairs of importance to private persons. His counsel were ever based on the principles of revealed religion – principles which he affirmed would stand unshaken and unimpaired when sycophany – expediency – worldly respectability – love of ease – and the dread of persecution – should be no more.
"The counsel which he counselled in those days, was if a man had enquired at the oracle of God".
John Fenwick
Summer Hill Grove
Newcastle Upon Tyne
14 June 1840
<Note - John Fenwick 1787-1867, was Vice President of the
Newcastle Literary & Philosophical Society 1855-65>
Newcastle, Emerson Charnley MDCCCXL
Source: The British Library
