Bird, Charles Smith

Bird, Charles Smith an English divine, was born at Liverpool, May 28, 1795. He studied law in his youth, and after his conversion entered Cambridge, in 1817, where he graduated in 1820. In 1821 he was offered the priricipalship of the New Royal College at Halifax, Nova Scotia; but, declining, took a party of young students, one of whom was Lord Macaulay, into Wales. In 1838 he took clerical duty at Mapledurham, and while there wrote Tracts for the Times and A Plea for the Reformation; placing him at once before the public as a controversialist of the first order. In 1843 he accepted the vicarage of Gainsborough, and in 1859 was collated to the chancellorship of Lincoln Cathedral, where he served the Church until his decease, Nov. 9, 1862. He also published Lectures on the Church Catechism (Lond. 1841). See Christian Observer, December, 1862, p. 960; Allibone, Dict. of Brit. and Amer. Authors, s.v.