John Askham

Askham was born at Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, on 25 July 1825. His father, John Askham, a native of Raunds in Northamptonshire, was a shoemaker, and his mother a native of Kimbolton. John Askham the younger was the youngest of seven children, and attended the Wellingborough Free School for about one year. He was twice married; he and his first wife (born Bonham) had three daughters.[1]

Before Askham reached age ten, his family put him to work in the shoemaking trade. After working a while for another shoemaker, he set up his own business. He later became the librarian of the newly formed Literary Institute at Wellingborough. In 1871, Askham was elected a member of the first town school board, and in 1874 he became school attendance officer and sanitary inspector of the local board of health.[1]

Educating himself, Askham started writing poetry.[1] He composed his first verses at the age 25, prompted by a Chartist workmate, though he himself was not so political; and later contributed poems to local newspapers. George James De Wilde, editor of the Northampton Mercury, befriended him and gave him work as a correspondent.[2]

Askham was especially fond of the sonnet form. Unlike John Clare (1793-1864), an early influence, he did not live a country life.[1][2]

In his later years, Askham was disabled by paralysis. He died at Clare Cottage, Wellingborough, on 28 October 1894, and was buried on 1 November in Wellingborough cemetery. He was survived by his second daughter.[1]

Askham published four volumes by subscription, and through one of his subscribers, George Ward Hunt, he received a grant of £50 from the Queen's Bounty Fund.[1] His works were:

• Sonnets on the Months and other Poems 1863.
• Descriptive Poems, Miscellaneous Pieces and Miscellaneous Sonnets 1866.
• Judith and other Poems, and a Centenary of Sonnets 1868.
• Poems and Sonnets 1875.
• Sketches in Prose and Verse 1893.