Horace Twiss

Horace Twiss (1787-1849) became a solicitor and friend and colleague of Crabb Robinson by 1809 and appears often thereafter in his Diary and Reminiscences. Twiss later became MP for Wootton Basset (1820-30) and Newport (1830-31), as well as serving as Counsel for the Admiralty and Judge-Advocate of the Fleet, Undersecretary for the Colonies (1828) and Vice-Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (1844). Besides composing the farewell address delivered by his famous aunt upon her retirement from the stage in 1812, Twiss also published a poem, St. Stephen’s Chapel (1807); an edition (with his own lyrics) of Scottish Melodies (1812; a play, The Carib Chief (1819); some works on legal reform; and in 1844, his important 3-volume work, The Public and Private Life of Lord Chancellor Eldon. His mother was the sister of the actresses Fanny Kemble and Sarah Siddons. She and her husband, Francis Twiss, operated a prosperous school at 24 Camden Place, Bath. Mrs. Twiss appears in a letter by Penelope Pennington to Hays, 11 November 1813. A short entry on Twiss appears in Samuel Austen Allibone’s Critical Dictionary of English Literature (1882), 3:2487.