Burnaby, Andrew

, D. D. archdeacon of Leicester and vicar of Greenwich, was born in 1732, at Asfordby in Leicestershire, of which place his father, grandfather, and great grandfather, were in succession patrons and rectors, as his youngest brother is at this time. He was elected into Westminster college in 1748, but removed from that school, and was entered of Queen’s college, Cambridge, where he took his bachelor’s degree in 1754, and his master’s in 1757. After having travelled through the middle settlements in North America in 1759 and 1760, | Dr. Burnaby was appointed chaplain to the British factory at Leghorn, were he resided five years; in occasional excursions visited Corsica, and almost every part of Italy; and during the last of those years (sir John Dick having obtained his majesty’s leave to return to England for his private concerns) had the honour to do the consular business, by the appointment of government, under the denomination of proconsul. In 1769 he was presented to the vicarage of Greenwich; and in 1786 the archdeaconry of Leicester was conferred on him by bishop Thurlow, without the least expectation or solicitation on his part; both which preferments he enjoyed till his death, March 9, 1812. His widow, the heiress of John Edwyn, esq. of Bagrave in Leicestershire, died on the 16th of the same month, aged seventy-six. Dr. Burnaby was distinguished by the purest integrity and benevolence of heart, the most unaffected urbanity of manners, and a lively and ardent zeal for his profession. His principal works were, 1. “Travels through the middle settlements in North America in the years 1759 and 1760, with observations upon the state of the colonies,” 1775, 4to, of which a third edition, considerably enlarged, was published in 1798-9. 2. Various Sermons, preached on Fast, Thanksgiving, and other public occasions, and some charges, reprinted together in one vol. 8vo, 1805. Most of them were highly valued both for matter and manner. He printed also, for the use of particular friends, “A Journal of a Tour to Corsica in the year 1766, with a series of original letters from general Paoli to the author, referring to the principal events which have taken place in that island from the year 1769 to 1302, with explanatory notes,” 1804. ¹