Derwent Coleridge - Early Life

Early Life

Derwent Coleridge was born at Keswick, Cumberland, 14 Sept. 1800 (Derwent Water is not far away). He was sent with his brother Hartley to be educated at a small school near Ambleside. The two brothers were in those days in continual intercourse with Southey and Wordsworth. Derwent was sent to St. John's College, Cambridge, where he formed intimate lifelong friendships with W. M. Praed, Macaulay, John Moultrie, Sidney Walker, Charles Austin, and Bulwer. In the autumn of 1822 he joined them as a contributor to Knight's Quarterly Magazine. His contributions, signed ‘DAVENANT CECIL,’ were mostly poetical. He proceeded B.A. 1824, and M.A. 1829.

In 1825 he was ordained by William Carey, Bishop of Exeter; soon afterwards he was appointed master of the grammar school at Helston, Cornwall. One of his most distinguished pupils there was Charles Kingsley. While at Helston he published his largest work, The Scriptural Character of the English Church (1839). He agrees with the conclusions which Mr. Gladstone supported in Church Principles considered in their Results, published the following year, although Mr. Gladstone wrote as a pronounced high churchman, while Coleridge aimed at setting forth the views of his father on church and state. The avowal that he wished to be regarded as his father's disciple induced F. D. Maurice to dedicate to him his Kingdom of Christ. Coleridge's book, though eloquent, missed popularity, perhaps on account of its impartiality.