Mrs Danvers (d. 1803): Mother of Charles Danvers. She lived at Kingsdown in Bristol and became very close to Southey when he was resident in the city in the late 1790s and 1802–1803. After her death in the influenza epidemic of 1803, Southey described her as someone ‘whom I regarded with something like a family affection.’

Charles Danvers (c. 1764-1814): Bristol wine merchant, trading under the name Danvers and White. He was distantly related to the regicides Sir John Danvers (1584/5–1655; DNB) and General Thomas Harrison (c. 1616–60; DNB) and to the diarist Celia Fiennes (1662–1741; DNB). (Southey possessed a manuscript of Fiennes diary which he had been given by the Danvers family and included unacknowledged excerpts from it in his and Coleridge’s Omniana (1812).) Danvers’ father had ‘been a person of some property’, though the family’s fortunes had since declined.

Hew Whitefoord Dalrymple, 1st Baronet (1750–1830): Army officer. In summer 1808, as commander of the British forces in Portugal, he was responsible for agreeing to the highly controversial Convention of Cintra, by which the French army, its arms and spoils were repatriated in British ships. Dalrymple was recalled to England shortly afterwards and appeared before a government-appointed board of inquiry, which determined that he be exonerated of all blame. Although he was subsequently promoted, reaching the rank of General in 1812, he never received another command.

Alexander Robert Charles Dallas (1791-1869): The son of the barrister and man of letters Robert Charles Dallas (1754–1824; DNB). In later life he became an evangelical Church of England clergyman and organiser of the Irish Church Missions to the Roman Catholics. As a young man he had served as an army officer during the Peninsular War and at Waterloo, and had composed literary and musical pieces about the Peninsular campaign.

Allan Cunningham (1784-1842): Poet, songwriter, and periodical writer. Cunningham, the son of a Dumfriesshire factor, was immersed in the literary culture of the Scottish borders. As a youth, he heard Robert Burns (1759–1796; DNB) recite and later walked in Burns’ funeral procession; visited James Hogg (who became a friend); and walked to Edinburgh to catch sight of Walter Scott. The Remains of Nithsdale and Galloway Song (1811), whose ‘old’ poems were actually modern compositions by Cunningham, attracted attention.

Mrs Crothers (dates and first name unknown): A Keswick neighbour of the Southeys. She lived opposite the Vicarage of Crosthwaite Church and was a regular visitor to the Southey household in the 1810s and 1820s.

William Coxe (1748-1828): Clergyman, historian and travel writer. His successful clerical career culminated in his appointment as Archdeacon of Wiltshire 1804–1828, but he devoted most of his time to historical writings, including History of the House of Austria (1807) and Memoirs of the Bourbon Kings of Spain (1813). Coxe concentrated on diplomatic exchanges and high politics, leading Southey to view his books as very dull, if worthy. The two corresponded briefly about European history.

Joseph Cottle (1770-1853): Bristolian author, bookseller and publisher. Although Coleridge’s biographer James Dykes Campbell joked ‘I never heard of ... [Cottle’s] having ... any [parents], and think it very doubtful. I should think he was found under a booksellers counter wrapped in Felix Farley’s newspaper’, Joseph was in fact the second child of Robert and Sarah Cottle. He was educated at the school run by Richard Henderson (1736/7–1792) at Hanham, near Bristol. In 1791 he opened a shop as a printseller, stationer, binder and bookseller in Bristol.

Amos Simon Cottle (1768?-1800): Poet and translator. Elder brother of Joseph Cottle. Educated at the school run by Richard Henderson (1736/7–1792) at Hanham, near Bristol, and Magdalene College, Cambridge (matric. 1795, BA 1799). He then embarked on a legal training. He spent the final year of his life in London, where he was a friend of George Dyer and Charles Lamb, and died in his chambers at Clifford’s Inn. Author of Icelandic Poetry, or, The Edda of Saemund, Translated into English verse (1797; published by Joseph Cottle and with a dedicatory poem by Southey).

The children of Robert Cottle, an unsuccessful Bristol tailor and draper. The family included Amos, Joseph and Robert (?1780–1858), a painter and founder of his own religious sect (‘the Cottlelites’), and five sisters, Elizabeth (c. 1764–1789), Mary (?1772–1839), Ann (?1780–1855), Sarah (d. 1834) and Martha (c. 1785–1800). Southey seems to have been acquainted with the entire Cottle family. After their secret marriage in November 1795, his wife Edith lived with the Cottle sisters for some of the time Southey was absent in Spain and Portugal.