Philip Doddridge - Early Life

Early Life

Philip Doddridge was born in London in an unknown location the last of the twenty children of Daniel Doddridge (d 1715), a dealer in oils and pickles. His father was a son of John Doddridge (1621–1689), rector of Shepperton, Middlesex, who resigned his living after the Act of Uniformity of 1662 and became a nonconformist minister, and a great-nephew of the judge and MP Sir John Doddridge (1555–1628). Philip's mother, Monica, considered to have been the greater influence on him, was the orphan daughter of the Rev. John Bauman, a Lutheran clergyman who had fled from Prague to escape religious persecution. In England, Rev. John Bowerman (as he became known) had held for some time the mastership of the grammar school at Kingston upon Thames. Before Philip could read, his mother began to teach him the history of the Old and New Testament from blue Dutch chimney-tiles on the chimney place of their sitting room.

In his youth, Philip Doddridge was educated first by a tutor employed by his parent then boarded at a private school in London. In 1712, he then attended the grammar school at Kingston-upon-Thames studying under Rev Daniel Mayo where his grandfather had worked.

His mother died when he was only 8 years old on 12 April 1711. Four years later his father died on 17 July 1715. He then had a guardian named Downes who moved him to another private school at St Albans where he was much influenced by the Presbyterian minister Samuel Clarke (not to be confused with Samuel Clarke, (1599–1683), the English clergyman and Puritan biographer).