Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Watkins, Charles Frederick
WATKINS, CHARLES FREDERICK (1793–1873), author, born in 1793, was son of William Watkins, rector of Portaynon, Glamorganshire, and was educated at Christ's Hospital. In 1810 he joined the Hotspur frigate as midshipman, but left the service at the peace. He entered Christ's College, Cambridge, in 1818, was ordained as a literate, and, after serving curacies at Downton (Wiltshire) and Windsor (1820), was appointed in 1822 master of Farley Hospital, Salisbury. He was interested in geology, and formed a collection of cretaceous fossils, some of which are in the British Museum. In April 1832 he became vicar of Brixworth, Northamptonshire, retaining that preferment till his death on 15 July 1873. While living there he communicated to the Royal Society an ‘Account of Aurora Borealis of 17 Nov. 1848’ (Proc. v. 809). He published, besides various prose pamphlets, the following single or collected poems: ‘Eidespernox,’ 1821; ‘Sacred Poems,’ 1829; ‘The Infants' Death,’ 1829; ‘The Human Hand,’ &c., 1852; ‘The Twins of Fame,’ 1854; ‘The Day of Days,’ 1872; also a ‘Vindication of the Mosaic History of Creation,’ 1867, and ‘The Basilica’ (on Brixworth church), 1867.
[Men of the Reign; Brit. Mus. Libr. Cat.; information from the Rev. A. K. Pavey, vicar of Brixworth.]