Price, Richard |
| MATHEMATICIAN, PHILOSOPHER, STATESMAN (WALES) |
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BORN 23 Mar 1723, Llangeinor, Glamorgan: Tyn Ton farm house - DIED 19 Apr 1791, London: Newington Green GRAVE LOCATION London: Bunhill Fields Burial Ground, City Road, Finsbury |
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Richard Price was the son of the dissenting minister Rhys Price. He studied with John Eames at the dissenting academy in Moorfields, London. In 1744 he bcame chaplain at Stoke Newington then a village to the North of London. In 1758 he went to moved to Newington Green and became minister to the Newington Green meeting-house. Thomas Amory was a collegue there from 1770 onwards. In 1761 he became literary executor of his friend Thomas Bayes and in 1763 he published Bayes' "An Essay towards solving a Problem in the Doctrine of Chances". In 1765 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. In 1776 he supported the American colonies in their War of Independence and this made him famous. This made him famous in England and Benjamin Frankin became a close friend. He was a member of the "Club of Honest Whigs", a society of arts that was also counted Benjamin Franklin, Joseph Priestley and Sir John Pringle among its members. He was visited by Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine and he was aquainted with David Hume and Adam Smith. Around 1790, Price introduced Mary Wollstonecraft to Joseph Johnson, who published her works. After he declared that the English, like the French, had the right to remove a bad king, he was attacked by Edmund Burke in "Reflections on the Revolution in France" and defended by Wollstonecraft in "A Vindication of the Rights of Men". Wollstonecraft's "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman" extended Price's arguments about equality to women. He died in Newington Green, London in 1791 and, like his friend Bayes, was buried at the Bunhill Fields Burial Ground where his tomn can still be seen. Related persons • was a friend of Bayes, Thomas • was a friend of Franklin, Benjamin • was a friend of Wollstonecraft, Mary |
| Images |
 The grave of Richard Price at Bunhill Burial Fields, London. Picture by Androom (20 Aug 2017) |
