Henry Vaughan

VAUGHAN, Henry, b. Newton-by-Usk, Llansanffraid, Breconshire, April 1622; d. Llansanffraid, 23 April 1695. Born into an old, though impoverished, Welsh family, he was educated by a clergyman-schoolmaster, Matthew Herbert of Llangattock, and then at Jesus College, Oxford, from 1638. Leaving in 1640 before taking his degree, Vaughan then studied law in London at the wish of his father. Attempting to escape the consequences of the Civil War (he fought on the Royalist side), he returned to South Wales by 1647 to practise medicine at Newton-by-Usk for the rest of his life. On his tomb he called himself Siluris (‘The Silurist’), proud of his association with Breconshire where he lived and which...