Thomas, a late unfortunate poet, whose fate and performances have excited in no small degree the public attention, as well as given rise to much literary controversy. He was born at Bristol, Nov. 20, 1752; and educated at a charity school on St Augustine's Back, where nothing more was taught than reading, writing, and accounts. At 14 years of age, he was articled clerk to an attorney at Bristol, with whom he continued about three years; yet, though his education was thus confined, he discovered an early turn towards poetry and English antiquities, and particularly towards heraldry. How soon he began to be an author is not known. In the Town and Country Magazine for March 1769, are two letters, probably from him, as they are dated from Bristol, and subscribed with his usual signature, D. B. that is, Dunhelmus Chatterton. Britfoliensis. The former contains short extracts from two MSS. "written 300 years ago by one Rowley a monk," concerning dyes in the age of Henry II.; the latter, "Ethelgar, a Saxon poem," in bombast prose. In the same magazine for May 1769, are three communications from Bristol, with the same signature D. B., one of them entitled, "Observations upon Saxon Heraldry, with drawings of Saxon Achievements;" and in the subsequent months of 1769 and 1770, there are several other pieces in the same magazine, which are undoubtedly of his composition.

In April 1770, he left Bristol, disgusted with his profession, and irreconcilable to the line of life in which he was placed; and coming to London in hopes of advancing his fortune by his pen, he sunk at once from the sublimity of his views to an absolute dependence on the patronage of booksellers. Things, however, seem soon to have brightened up a little with him; for, May 14, he writes to his mother, in high spirits, upon the change of his situation, with the following sarcastic reflections upon his former patrons at Bristol. "As to Mr ____, Mr ____, Mr ____, &c. &c. they rate literary lumber so low, that I believe an author, in their estimation, must be poor indeed: but here matters are otherwise. Had Rowley been a Londoner instead of a Briton, I could have lived by copying his works." In a letter to his sister, May 30, he informs her that he is to be employed in writing a voluminous History of London, to appear in numbers the beginning of next winter. Meanwhile, he had written something in praise of Beckford, then lord mayor, which had procured him the honour of being presented to his lordship; and, in the letter just mentioned, he gives the following account of his reception, with certain observations upon political writing. "The lord mayor received me as politely as a citizen could: but the devil of the matter is, there is no money to be got on this side of the question.—However, he is a poor author who cannot write on both sides.—Essays on the patriotic side will fetch no more than what the copy is sold for. As the patriots themselves are searching for places, they have no gratuity to spare.—On the other hand, unpopular essays will not even be accepted, and you must pay to have them printed; but then you seldom lose by it, as courtiers are so sensible of their deficiency in merit, that they generously reward all who know how to daub them with the appearance of it."

He continued to write incessantly in various periodical publications. July 11, he tells his sister that he had pieces last month in several magazines; in The Gospel Magazine, The Town and Country, The Court and City, The London, The Political Register, &c. But all these exertions of his genius brought in so little profit, that he was soon reduced to the extreme indigence; so that at last, oppressed with poverty and disease, in a fit of despair, he put an end to his existence, August 1770, with a dose of poison. This unfortunate person, though certainly a most extraordinary genius, seems yet to have been a most ungracious composition. He was violent and impetuous to a strange degree. From the first of the above cited letters he seems to have had a portion of ill humour and spleen more than enough for a lad of 17; and the editor of his his Miscellanies records, "that he possessed all the vices and irregularities of youth, and that his profligacy was at least as conspicuous as his abilities."

In 1777 were published in one volume 8vo, "Poems, supposed to have been written at Bristol, by Thomas Rowley and others, in the 15th century: the greatest part now first published from the most authentic copies, with an engraved specimen of one of the MSS. To which are added, a Preface, an introductory Account of the several Pieces, and a Glossary." And in 1778, were published, in one volume 8vo, "Miscellanies in Prose and Verse by Thomas Chatterton, the supposed author of the Poems published under the names of Rowley, &c."

Of Rowley's poems, we have the following account in the preface, given in the words of Mr George Catcot of Bristol, to whom, it is said, the public is indebted for them. "The first discovery of certain MSS. having been deposited in Redclift church above three centuries ago, was made in the year 1768, at the time of opening the new bridge at Bristol; and was owing to a publication in Farley's Weekly Journal, Oct. 1, containing an account of the ceremonies observed at the opening of the old bridge, taken, as it was said, from a very ancient MS. This excited the curiosity of some persons to inquire after the original. The printer, Mr Farley, could give no account of it, or of the person who brought the copy; but, after much inquiry, it was discovered that this person was a youth between 15 and 16 years of age, whose name was Thomas Chatterton, and whose family had been sextons of Redclift church for near 150 years. His father, who was now dead, had also been master of the free school in Pile-street. The young man was at first very unwilling to discover from whence he had the original: but, after many promises made to him, was at last prevailed on to acknowledge that he had received this, together with many other MSS. from his father, who had found them in a large chest in an upper room over the chapel, on the north side of Redclift church."

It is added, that soon after this Mr Catcot commenced an acquaintance with Chatterton, and partly as presents, partly as purchases, procured from him copies of many of his MSS. in prose and verse; as other copies were disposed of in like manner to others. It is concluded, however, that whatever may have been Chatterton's part in this very extraordinary transaction, whether he was the author, or only (as he constantly affected) the copier of all these productions, he appears to have kept the secret entirely to himself, and not to have put it in any one's power to bear certain testimony either of his fraud or of his veracity.

This affair, however, hath since become the foundation of a mighty controversy among the critics, which hath yet scarcely subsided. The poems in question, published in 1777, were republished in 1778, with an "Appendix, containing some observations upon their language; tending to prove that they were written, not by any ancient author, but entirely by Chatterton." Mr Warton, in the third volume of his History of English Poetry, hath espoused the same side of the question. Mr Walpole also obliged the world with a Letter on Chatterton, from his pres at Strawberry-hill. On the other hand have appeared, "Observations" upon these poems, "in which their authenticity is ascertained," by Jacob Bryant, Esq.; 1781, 2 vols. 8vo; and another edition of the "Poems, with a Comment, Chatterton," by Jeremiah Miles, D.D., dean of Exeter, 1782, 4to. In answer to these two works, we have had three pamphlets: 1. "Curious Observations on the Poems, and Remarks on the Commentaries of Mr Bryant and Dr Miles; with a salutary proposal addressed to the friends of these gentlemen." 2. "An Archaeological Epistle to Dean Miles, editor of a superb edition of Rowley's Poems, &c." 3. "An Inquiry into the authenticity of the Poems attributed to Thomas Rowley, in which the Arguments of the dean of Exeter and Mr Bryant are examined, by Thomas Warton?" and other pieces in the public prints and magazines: All preparatory to the complete settlement of the business in "A Vindication of the Appendix to the Poems called Rowley's, in reply to the Answers of the dean of Exeter, Jacob Bryant, Esq. and a third Anonymous Writer; with some further Observations upon these Poems, and an Examination of the Evidence which has been produced in support of their Authenticity. By Thomas Tyrwhitt, 1782," 8vo.