July 11th Thomas Flindell (Death)
     

Helford – born Thomas Flindell (1767 – 1824), was a printer and newspaper editor and entrepreneur.

Describing himself as ‘bred an illiterate half-seaman’, Flindell became apprenticed to a Helston printer and was sent to Yorkshire to edit, produce and print the ‘Doncaster Gazette’.  He made his reputation by increasing the circulation by guessing, correctly, the verdicts in a number of trials.  In 1798, he moved to Helston to open a print shop,  established the ‘Stannary Press’ and began publishing The Royal Cornwall Gazette’ (July 2nd). He made connections in Cornwall by publishing works by Rev. Richard Polwhele (January 6th) and R.S. Hawker (December 3rd).

In 1800, now in Falmouth, he printed numbered impressions of the Bible with some of the Books of the Bible introduced by Polwhele.

In 1813 he produced, in Exeter, he started the Tory-supporting ‘Western Luminary’, and he was prosecuted for his libel of Queen Caroline for which he served eight months in Exeter gaol.

After a long illness, he died at Exeter on 11 July 1824, aged 57.


                                                                                                                                          Previous                                 Next