POWNALL, Thomas, English statesman, colonial governor and author: b. near Lin coln, 1722; d. Bath, 25 Feb. 1805. He was graduated at Cambridge in 1743. In 1753 he went to America as private secretary to Sir Danvers Osborn, governor of New York, and in 1757 was made governor of the colony of Massachusetts Bay. He showed considerable disinclination to carry out the policies of his superiors in London and as a result he was transferred to South Carolina in 1760 as gov ernor of this colony. Without having gone to South Carolina he returned to England in June 1760 and soon after his arrival resigned the governorship. In 1762-63 he was comptroller general of the expenditures of the army in Ger many, and in 1768 was elected to Parliament. He earnestly opposed the measures of the gov ernment against the colonies. After being three times returned to Parliament, he retired in 1780 and passed the remainder of his life in anti quarian studies. In the sphere of scholarship
he achieved a greater reputation than that which he won in the field of politics. His writ ings have a wide range of subjects, and among his principal works are 'Administration of the (1764) ; A Memorial to the Sover eigns of America) (1773) ; 'A Topographical Description of the Middle Colonies) (1776) ; Memorial to the Sovereigns of Europe on the State of Affairs between the Old and the New World' (1780) ; 'Notices and Descriptions of the Antiquities of the Provincia Romana of Gaul) (1788) ; 'Intellectual Physics) (1795) ; A Treatise on Old Age' (1801) ; 'A Memorial to the Sovereigns of Europe and the (1803), and numerous .monographs on anti quarian subjects. Consult Pownall, Chas. A. W., 'Thomas Pownall) (London 1908).