Richard Baldwin Jr. (1724–1770; fl. 1746–?)

Identifiers

  • Grubstreet: 12569

Dates

  • Apprenticeship: 1740
  • Freedom: 1747
  • Clothed: 1747

Names

  • Richard Baldwin Jr.
  • R Baldwin

Richard Baldwin, Jr., at the Rose, no. 47 Paternoster Row, 1746–1760.

He obtained his freedom on 3 February 1747, and was clothed 6 October 1747.

Richard Baldwin junior was born in the heart of the London booktrade district probably 27 November 1724; the second son of Richard and Hannah Baldwin, he was christened 13 December in the parish church of St. Martin Ludgate. His father, Richard Baldwin senior, had already served a number of years in the trade ... In 1740 when Richard junior was fifteen years old, he was sent out of London to Salisbury to serve his apprenticeship with Benjamin Collins (1715–1785). The Collins-Baldwin connection must have been based in Berkshire: Benjamin Collins was born in Faringdon, where Robert Baldwin, an apothecary and Richard senior's brother, still lived with his family. A number of Richard junior's cousins, including Robert (1737–1810) and Henry (1734–1813), important figures in the late eighteenth-century booktrade, were also born in Faringdon. William Collins (1705–1740?), Benjamin's eldest brother, was a Salisbury bookseller and printer whose name is found in earlier partnerships with Richard Baldwin senior and with Thomas Astley, who was another Berkshire transplant to London. Astley is also the firstLondon distributor to be listed in the colophon of the Salisbury Journal. So the Berkshire-Wiltshire-London links were already well established when Richard junior began his apprenticeship in September 1740.

... Most of the editions recorded in the ESTC Baldwin search for 1747 through 1769 can now be assigned to Richard Baldwin junior in Pasternoster Row, as retailer (that is, the book was sold by him), sole copyholder, or partner (the book was printed for him alone or in partnership) on the basis of the imprints—on the form of name, the address, and the relationship with other names.—C.Y. Ferdinand, "Richard Baldwin Junior, Bookseller," Studies in Bibliography 42 (1989): 255–256; 259

Notes & Queries "London Booksellers Series" (1931–2)

BALDWIN, RICHARD (II). He died at Birmingham on June 4, 1777, aged eighty-six years, and may possibly have been the son of Richard and Anne Baldwin above, though that is by no means certain [n.b. it is his father, bookseller of St. Paul's Churchyard, who died in 1777.]. The earliest mention of him which I have found goes back to November, 1746, when he was publishing at the sign of the Rose in Paternoster Row. He was still at the same address in 1760. Iun [sic.] April, 1747, he bought the publishing rights of the London Magazine from Astley, and continued to issue it under his own name until his death.

—Frederick T. Wood, 18 July 1931

 

BALDWIN,RICHARD, (II). At the Rose in Paternoster Row (1746–1760), Chubb, in his ' Printed Maps of Great Britain,' says that this man "was the son of Richard Baldwin, bookseller, of St. Paul's Churchyard," but unfortunately he gives no closer address for the father, and I have found no other trace of him. Hilton Price extends the son's date to 1766. Chubb says that Richard Baldwin II died in January, 1770, though DR. WOOD seems to have good reason for saying that he died in Birmingham on June 4, 1777." Chubb adds that "he was succeeded by Robert Baldwin, a nephew of the elder Richard, who carried on the business until 1810."

—Ambrose Heal, 8 August 1931

Ian Maxted, Exeter Working Papers in Book History (2005–present)

Baldwin, Richard II. Married July 7, 1750, Mr. Richard Baldwin, jun., bookseller, in Paternoster-row, to Miss Baldwin, of Farringdon, Berks (LM 1750, 333). This day is published (price 6d) An essay on the summer entertainments in the neighbourhood of London, by Humphrey Quearmoode, esq. Printed for and sold by D.Job, at the Spread Eagle in King-street, Covent-garden, R.Baldwin at the Rose in Paternoster-row; and P.Stevens, at the Bible and Crown, facing Stationers' Hall (Daily Advertiser 6 Sep 1750). This day is publish'd in two volumes price 6s, a new edition in Calf, the fifth ... The Lady's friendly monitor, containing upwars of 3000 different receipts ... Printed for T.Read, in White Fryars, Fleet-street; and R.Baldwin at the Rose in Paternoster-row ... (Daily Advertiser 28 Aug 1752).