Note 403 — Chapter X · THOMAS AND JOHN JAMES, 1710.

Nichols’ note on the James family (Anecdotes of Mr. Bowyer, pp. 585, 609) is at variance with the account given by Rowe Mores. According to the former, Thomas, John and George James were all brothers, and sons of the notorious half-crazy Elianor James, whose husband, Thomas James, the printer, was a large benefactor to Sion College, and died in 1711. On this point, however, Mores, whose relations with the family gave him special opportunities for information, may be considered as more correct in representing Thomas and John as sons of the Rev. John James. George James, the son of Thomas and Elianor, was City Printer in 1724. His office was in Little Britain, where he wrote and printed the Post Boy. He was Common Councilman for the Ward of Aldersgate Without, and died in 1735. His greatgrandfather, Dr. Thomas James, Dean of Wells, was the first Keeper of Bodley’s Library at Oxford in 1605. Portraits of this Dr. Thomas James, and of Thomas and Elianor, the parents of George James, are preserved in Sion College, as is also a portrait of Elizabeth, their daughter, who married Jacob Ilive, the printer, and who was herself a benefactor to the College. Nichols mentions another member of the family, one Harris James, who, he says, was originally a letter-founder, and “formerly of Covent Garden Theatre, where he represented fops and footmen.”