Thomas Love Peacock

Thomas Love Peacock was born on 18 October 1785 at Weymouth in Dorset, the only child of Samuel and Sarah Peacock (née Love). His father Samuel, of whom little is known, seems to drop out of sight entirely, although a doubtful family tradition has it that he died in 1788. In this year Sarah left London with her son for the Thames village of Chertsey where her parents were living. Thenceforth, the dominant male influence in the child's life was his grandfather, Thomas Love, a former Master in the Royal Navy who was retired on half-pay after being wounded in a naval action. The more significant parental influence, however, was the maternal one. Sarah Love Peacock seems to have been a remarkable woman. A widow in straitened circumstances