HOWARD, JOHN, one of the most disinterested, laborious, and useful philanthropists that have done honour to any age or nation, wa.s born about 1726. His father was a London tradesman, who apprenticed him to • wholesale grocer, but dying when his eon was about nineteen years of age, and leaving him in possession of a hand some fortune, young Howard, who was in weak health, succeeded in purchasing the time remaining of his indentures, and determined on making a tour in France and Italy. On his return, still in ill health, he took lodgings in Stoke Newington, where his landlady • widow named Loidore—having nursed him carefully through a severe illness, ho out of gratitude married her, though she was twenty seven years his senior. She however died about three years after the inarriaga ; and he now conceived a desire to visit Lisbon, a chief inducement being his wish to do something to alleviate the miseries caused by the great earthquake in 1756. lle embarked accordingly, but was captured by a French privateer, and carried a prisoner into the port of Brest, Rod subsequently removed Into the interior, hut after a while was permitted to return to England on the promise that if he could not iuduee the government to make a suitable exchange fur him he would return to his captivity. The exchange was obtained however, and I ioward retired to • small estate he possessed at Carding ton, near Bedford ; and there, in April 1758, he married a second wife, Miss Henrietta Leeds. The lady appears to have been in every way a suitable match for him ; but it is mentioned as a characteristic trait, that he stipulated before marriage "that in all matters in which there should be a difference of opinion between them his voice should rule." For seven years they lived in unbroken happiness, leading a quiet domestic life: he chiefly engaged in improving his grounds, rebuilding his house, cultivating his farm, and with even more earnestness setting himself to the task of raising the physical and moral condition of the peasantry of Cardingtan and its neighbourhood, by erecting ou his own estate better cottages, establishing schools, and visiting and relieving the sick and the destitute; and she iu all ways assisting him in his beuevolent exertions But at the end of that time, after giving birth to a son, she died, March 1765, and Howard, who was devotedly attached to her, from that time lost his interest in his home and its occupations. Till it appeared advisable to send his eon to a distance for his education, Howard lived at Cardington in seclusion ; then, unable to bear the solitude of the plaoa with all its painful associations, he made another continental tour. In 1773 he was nominated sheriff of Bedford. The sufferings which he had endured and witnessed during his owu brief confinement as a prisoner of war struck deep into his mind. The impression was now renewed and intensified when, as sheriff, he had charge of the prisons of the county. Shocked by the misery and abuses which prevailed, he attempted to induce the magistrates to remedy the more obvious of them. The reply was a demand for a precedent, and Howard at once set out on a tour of inspection to other county prisons in the hope to find it. But he eoon began to suspect that the evil was general, and now eat himself diligeutly to work to inquire into the extent and precise nature of the mischief, end if possible to discover the true remedy for tho evil. In
that year he visited, in two journeys, most of the town and county jails of England, and accumulated a largo mass of information, which, in March 1774, he laid before the House of Commons. This was the commencement of prison reform in England ; fur in the same session two acts were passed, one for relieving acquitted prisoners from pay ment of fees, the other for preserving the health of prisoners. Once actively engaged, he became more and more devoted to this benevolent pursuit; insomuch that the history of his .remaining years is little more than the diary of his journeys, the only exception being in fact his becoming a candidate with his friend Mr. Whitbread for the repro eentation of Bedford in parliament. They were however defeated ; and though a parliamentary scrutiny placed Mr. Whitbread at the head of the poll, his friend—fortunately for the cause of humanity— was only. placed third on the list. Howard travelled repeatedly over the United Kingdom, and at different periods to almost every part of Europe, visiting the moat noisome places, relieving personally the wants of the most wretched objects, and noting all that seemed to him important either for warning or example. The first fruit of these labours was a 4to volume entitled 'The State of the Prisons in England and Wales, with some preliminary observations, and an account of some Foreign Prisons,' 1777. "As soon as it appeared, tho world was astonished at the mass of valuable materials accumulated by a private unaided individual, through a course of prodigious labour, and at the constant hazard of life, in consequence of the infectious diseases prevalent in the scones of his inquiries. The cool good sense and moderation of his narrative, contrasted with that enthusiastic ardour which must have impelled him to his undertaking, were not less admired ; and ho was immediately regarded as one of the extra ordinary characters of the age, and as the leader in all plans of meliorating the condition of that wretched part of the community fur whom he interested himself." (Aikin.) The House of Commons having seconded his views by the intro duction of • bill for the establishment of houses of correction, Mr. Howard, in 1778, undertook a fresh tour, principally to revisit the celebrated Rasp-houses of Holland ; but he continued his route through Belgium and Germany into Italy, whence he returned through Switzerland and France in 1779. In tho same year he made another survey of Great Britain and Ireland. In these tours he extended his views to the iuveatigation of hospitals. The results were published in 1780, in an ' Appendix to the State of the Prisons in England and Wales,' &c. In 1781, having now travelled over all tho south of Europe, except Spain mid Portugal, through which ho went in 1783, ho visited Denmark, Sweden, Russia, and l'oland ; and continuing at intervals his home inquiries, published in 1784 a second appendix, together with a new edition of the original work, in which the additional matter was comprised.