Life
?-.1798; at one time thought to be the author of the Letters of Junius
[ERR, see Conor Cruise O’Brien, The Great Melody, under Edmund Burke
q.v.]; ed. Westminster School, 2743, and Oxon., 1747; BCL, 1755; under-sc.
of state, 1755-58, MP for Great Bedwin, 1792; stock-jobber, bankrupt,
1769; in India, 1777-92; lived with his kinsman Edmund Burke at Beaconsfield,
1793. ODNB
[ top ]
Commentary
Stanley Ayling, Edmund Burke: His Life and Opinions (London:
John Murray 1988), note that William Burke left for Bengal with a warmest
letter of recommendation from Burke to Philip Francis (p.106). Further,
A pamphlet of 1779, by William Burke but almost certainly concluded by
Edmund, Making Conquests for the Mahometans. Ayling makes the odd
remark that Burke, in his partisanship to the Hindu raja of Tanjore, showed
how he never fell in love with Islam, tolerantly as he viewed it, but
almost fell in love with Hinduism (p.107.).
[ top ]