Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Hindley, John Haddon
HINDLEY, JOHN HADDON (1765–1827), oriental scholar, son of Charles Hindley, cloth mercer of Manchester, was born at that town in 1765, and educated at Manchester grammar school. In 1785 he went to Brasenose, Oxford, and in 1788 was elected a Hulme exhibitioner. He graduated B.A. 1788 and M.A. on 11 Oct. 1790). Two years later he was appointed chaplain of Manchester Collegiate Church, and librarian of the Chetham Library. The latter position he resigned in 1804. He was an accomplished and learned man, and had poetical abilities of no mean order. He was, however, reserved and crochety, and from his complaining abd querulous manner was called ‘the Book of Lamentations.’ In his later years his mind gave way. He died unmarried at Clapham on 17 June 1827.
The circumstance that the Chetham Library possessed many valuable oriental manuscripts led Hindley to the study of Persian. He wrote: 1. ‘Persian Lyrics or scattered Poems from the Diwan-i-Hafiz, with paraphrases in Verse and Prose,’ &c., 1800, 4to. 2. ‘Extracts, Epitomes, and Translations from Asiatick Authors,’ vol. i. 1807, 4to. 3. ‘Pendeh-i-Attar; the Counsels of Attar, edited from a Persian Manuscript,’ 1807 and 1814. 4. ‘Resemblances Linear and Verbal, translated from Jami by F. Gladwin, edited by J. H. H.,’ &c., 1811, 12mo.
[Smith's Manchester School Register (Chetham Soc.), i. 205; Thomas Wilson's Miscellanies (Chetham Soc.); Palatine Note-book, iv. 168; Foster's Alumni Oxon. p. 665; Brit. Mus. Cat.]