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1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Paltock, Robert

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17454941911 Encyclopædia Britannica, Volume 20 — Paltock, Robert

PALTOCK, ROBERT (1697–1767), English writer, the only son of Thomas Paltock of St James’s, Westminster, was born in 1697. He became an attorney and lived for some time in Clement’s Inn, whence he removed, before 1759, to Back Lane, Lambeth. He married Anna Skinner, through whom his son, also named Robert, inherited a small property at Ryme Intrinseca, Dorset. There Robert Paltock, who died in London on the 20th of March 1767, was buried. Paltock owes his fame to his romantic Life and Adventures of Peter Wilkins (1751), which excited the admiration of men like Coleridge, Southey, Charles Lamb, Sir Walter Scott and Leigh Hunt. It has been several times reprinted, notably with an introduction by Mr A. H. Bullen in 1884. It was translated into French (1763) and into German (1767).