To the Editor of The Times

Dear Sir, You will allow me to offer a very few words on behalf of my very highly esteemed friend, Mrs Bourhill, in consequence of her name having been quoted by an anonymous correspondent in your paper of the 13th inst. Concerning the affairs of the Children’s Friend Society, in whose service she has been ever since its establishment, I know, but little, and of its committee nothing whatever, and therefore am unable to answer any of the rebukes which it has recently suffered. But I have been acquainted with Mrs Bourhill for a term of 15 years. She is the widow of an officer of the commissariat department and every person that is acquainted with her, even much less intimately than I am, will corroborate my statement, when I say that she is incapable of a dishonourable, much less an inhumane, action. As matron of the institute at Chiswick, she won obedience and respect by her benevolent conduct towards the children in her charge; and I am quite confident that she has only to have an opportunity and she will most triumphantly exculpate herself, individually, from every shadow of blame. In the meantime, I demand, in justice to an absent and noble-minded woman, the insertion of these lines in your paper.

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,
Henry Samuel Baynes
No 40 St Johns Sq, Clerkenwell

The death is announced of Mr. Henry Samuel Baynes, a veteran and various worker in the world of letters. His father, to whom in early life he was apprenticed, was Mr. William Baynes, a famous bookseller and publisher of Paternoster Row, and above all distinguished for his faultless judgment and honour as a buyer of books, in which capacity he acted largely on behalf of Dr. Adam Clarke and his friends. Adam Clarke's confidence and friendship for the father were continued in favour of the son, who in 1823 became a publisher in Edinburgh, where he continued for some years and where in 1830 he edited and published The Olive Branch, a collection of pieces in prose and verse from various pens and on various religious subjects. Returning to London, he became a second hand bookseller in St John's Square and Pilgrim Street, Ludgate Hill; and in addition to other work of a like nature, assisted the late Mr. Henry G. Bohn in the preparation of his famous Guinea Catalogue. Finally, up to the age of 80 Mr. Baynes assisted Mr. Sampson Low in the production of the Publishers' Circular, of which Mr. Low was the originator. These facts express the official or professional life and activity of Mr. Baynes; to which, however, he occasionally added the kindly labour of literary production. He was maternally of Huguenot descent, and two of his most characteristic works were entitled Witnesses in Sackcloth, or a Descriptive Account of the Attack made upon the Reformed Churches of France in the Seventeenth Century, etc, by a Descendant of a Refugee, 1852; and The Evangelist of the Desert: Life of Claude Brousson, sometime advocate of Parliament at Toulouse in the reign of Louis XIV, afterwards a Protestant minister and martyr; from original and authentic records, 1853. Mr. Baynes, who was a member of one or two of the learned societies of Paris, had at one time the most complete collection of Huguenot literature ever brought together, which he sold to a Protestant Institution in France.

Books by Henry Samuel Baynes

2B12809 H.S.BAYNES A Biblical Exercise on the True Site of Calvary <913 -1858 [1857] 24N +L .(See Book Review)

2B12810 (Copy in John Rylands Library - Univ of Manchester) The Church at Philippi, or the doctrines and conduct of the early Christians illustrated: intended to serve as an historical commentary upon St Paul's epistle to the Philippians <209; 227; 281 1834 12N+ELO <-1835 12N (another issue) [main entry at O] cf BIBLE - Appx - Philippians - Miscellaneous +CLO See note 1 .

2B12811 (Copy in Manchester City Central Library) The Evangelist of the Desert: life of Claude Brousson, sometime Advocate of Parliament at Toulouse ... afterwards a Protestant minister and martyr <922 -1853 12N+L . (See Book Review)

2B12812 (Copy in The Huguenot Library - Univ College, London) Horae Lucanae: a biography of Saint Luke, descriptive and literary <226; 922 -1870 8N+CDEHLOW See note 2 .

2B12813 The Olive Branch [Religious extracts edited by H.S.Baynes] <242 -1830 Edinburgh 32N +L .

2B12814 The prophetic site of Calvary surveyed <913; 933 -1858 (14cm) +O .

2B12815 (Copy in Manchester City Central Library) The Witnesses in Sackcloth; or , a Descriptive account of the attack made upon the Reformed Churches of France in the seventeenth century. With a bibliographical and descriptive appendix. By a descendant of a refugee [ie H.S.Baynes] <274; 944 -1852 8N+C <-1852 12N[main entry at O] cf FRANCE - Reformed Churches - Appx +ELO . (See Book Review)

Note 1 Allibone SA - A critical Dictionary of English Literature 1859-1871 - has the following additional information; "with a recomm introduction by J.P.Smith DD" It also gives London as the place of publication .

Note 2 Kirk JF - A Supplement to Allibone - published in 1891 gives the following additional information; It gives the place of publication as London .

Note 3 Kirk JF - A Supplement to Allibone has the following additional book attributed to this author; Child Life and Youth of Jesus with consecutive illustrations London 1881 32mo .