Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Patmore, Peter George
PATMORE, PETER GEORGE (1786–1855), author, son of Peter Patmore, a dealer in plate and jewellery, was born in his father's house on Ludgate Hill in 1786. His mother was a daughter of the German painter Baeckermann, several of whose portraits are preserved in Hampton Court Palace. Patmore declined at an early age to accede to his father's wish that he should follow his own business. He adopted literature as a profession, became the intimate friend of William Hazlitt and Charles Lamb, and an active journalist and writer in London. In literary circles he was best known in connection with the ‘New Monthly Magazine,’ of which he was editor from Theodore Hook's death in 1841 until the periodical was acquired by W. Harrison Ainsworth in 1853. Patmore was also a frequent contributor to the ‘Liberal,’ the ‘Westminster,’ and ‘Retrospective’ reviews, and to ‘Blackwood’ and the ‘London’ and ‘Monthly’ magazines in their early and best days. Several of Lamb's most characteristic letters were addressed to him, as were also the curious epistles subsequently collected by Hazlitt under the title of the ‘Liber Amoris.’ Patmore's two best-known works were: 1. ‘Imitations of Celebrated Authors, or imaginary Rejected Articles,’ London, 1826, 8vo; a fourth edition appeared in 1844, with the title slightly modified and humorous preface omitted. The authors imitated were: Elia, Cobbett, Byron, White, Horace and James Smith, William Hazlitt, Jeffrey, and Leigh Hunt. 2. ‘My Friends and Acquaintances, being memorials, mind-portraits, and personal recollections of deceased celebrities of the nineteenth century, with selections from their unpublished letters,’ London, 3 vols. 8vo, 1854. These gossiping volumes were filled with personal notabilia concerning Lamb, Campbell, Lady Blessington, R. Plumer Ward, H. and J. Smith, Hazlitt, Laman Blanchard, R. B. and Thomas Sheridan; and the critics of 1854 (especially in the ‘Athenæum’ and ‘North British Review,’ May 1855) rebuked the author severely for their triviality and inconsequence; while the fact that the praise so freely accorded to R. Plumer Ward was absolutely withheld from Campbell elicited a storm of comment in a correspondence which ran in the ‘Athenæum’ for several months. Of the remainder of Patmore's works (several of which were issued anonymously and are difficult to trace) the more important were: 3. ‘Sir Thomas Laurence's Cabinet of Gems, with Biographical and Descriptive Memorials,’ 1837, fol. 4. ‘Chatsworth, or the Romance of a Week,’ 1844, 8vo. 5. ‘Marriage in Mayfair,’ a comedy, 1854, 8vo. He also wrote ‘The Mirror of the Months,’ 1826, 8vo, and ‘Finden's Gallery of Beauty, or the Court of Queen Victoria,’ 1844, 8vo. Patmore died near Hampstead on 19 Dec. 1855, aged 69. He married Miss Eliza Robertson, and left, with other issue, Mr. Coventry Patmore, author of ‘The Angel in the House.’
[Gent. Mag. 1856, i. 206; Allibone's Dict. of English Literature; Lamb's Correspondence, ed. Ainger; Hazlitt's Liber Amoris, ed. Le Gallienne; Times, 23 Nov. 1892; Brit. Mus. Cat.; private information.]