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11 - Writing History in the Eighteenth Century: Thomas Goodwin's The History of the Reign of Henry the Fifth (1704)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 July 2013

Christopher Allmand
Affiliation:
University of Liverpool
Gwilym Dodd
Affiliation:
Department of History, University of Nottingham
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Summary

Few will know of Thomas Goodwin, author of The History of the Reign of Henry the Fifth, King of England, &c., whose ‘Nine Books’ or chapters, each broadly covering a regnal year, was published in London in 1704. He was the son of another Thomas Goodwin, a leading divine of his day, regarded as one of the founding fathers of Congregationalism, who was president of Magdalen College, Oxford (before resigning at the restoration of the monarchy in 1660) and, as chaplain to Oliver Cromwell, had been in attendance at the Protector's deathbed. Thomas (the younger), born about 1650, received part of his education in the Low Countries, and later became a non-conformist minister whose main contribution was the foundation of a school at Pinner, in Middlesex, where future ministers received their training. He was also responsible for editing his father's writings, which appeared in a number of volumes. In 1695 he published A Discourse on the True Nature of the Gospel, and nine years later, ironically perhaps since it was the work of a man whose father had been associated with the abolition of monarchy, came the book on Henry V.

Short as it was, an earlier article on the younger Goodwin published in the original Dictionary of National Biography in 1890 had made reference to the book. Regrettably, it does not feature in either the longer entry or its appended list of ‘sources’ published in the more recent Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, a curious omission which denies Goodwin his right to be considered an early contributor to the historical reputation of the Lancastrian king.

Type
Chapter
Information
Henry V
New Interpretations
, pp. 273 - 288
Publisher: Boydell & Brewer
Print publication year: 2013

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