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THOMAS COOPER (1805–1892)

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Originally appearing in Volume V07, Page 81 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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THOMAS See also:COOPER (1805–1892)  , See also:English Chartist and writer, the son of a working See also:dyer, was See also:born at See also:Leicester on the loth of See also:March 1805 . After his See also:father's See also:death his See also:mother began business as a dyer and See also:fancy See also:box-maker at See also:Gainsborough . See also:Young See also:Cooper was apprenticed to a shoemaker . He had a See also:passion for knowledge; studied See also:Greek, Latin and See also:Hebrew in his spare See also:time; and in 1827 gave up cobbling to become a schoolmaster, and, later, a Methodist preacher . His affairs did not prosper, and after going to See also:Lincoln, where he obtained See also:work on a See also:local See also:news-See also:paper, he came to See also:London in 1839 . Here he became assistant to a second-See also:hand bookseller, but in 1849 he joined the See also:staff of the See also:Leicestershire See also:Mercury . His support of the Chartist See also:movement obliged him to resign his position, but he undertook to edit The Midland Counties Illuminator, a Chartist See also:journal, in 1841 . He became a See also:leader of the extreme Chartist party, and for his See also:action in urging on the strike of 1842 he was imprisoned in See also:Stafford See also:gaol for two years . Here he produced The See also:Purgatory of Suicides, a See also:political epic in ten books, embodying the See also:radical ideas of the time . In his efforts to publish this work after his liberation he came under the See also:notice of See also:Benjamin Disraeli and See also:Douglas See also:Jerrold . Through Jerrold's help it appeared in 1845, and Cooper then turned his See also:attention to lecturing upon See also:historical and educational subjects . In 1856 he suddenly renounced the See also:free-thinking doctrines which he had held for many years, and became a lecturer on See also:Christian evidences .

He died at Lincoln on the 15th of See also:

July 1892 . Among his other See also:works may be mentioned the See also:Bridge of See also:History over the Gulf of Time (1871) and the See also:Life of See also:Thomas Cooper, written by Himself (1872) .

End of Article: THOMAS COOPER (1805–1892)
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