Andrew Bell (1753-1832): Scottish clergyman, the founder and tireless advocate of the ‘Madras’ system of schooling. When a chaplain in India, Bell introduced to the Madras Orphan Asylum the ‘monitorial’ system, wherein brighter children were charged with supervising groups of slower children, and all were motivated by a graduated scale of rewards and punishments. Returning to Britain, Bell promoted the system in a series of publications and attempted to have it instituted by a board of education controlled by the Church of England.

Alfred Beesley (1799/1800-1847): Antiquary. He was born into a Quaker family in Oxfordshire, though he later left the Society of Friends. He did not complete his apprenticeship to a watchmaker, instead devoting himself to literary and scientific pursuits. His Japheth: Contemplation and Other Pieces was published by Longman in 1834 and his History of Banbury appeared in 1841. In 1824 he wrote to Southey requesting information on the latter’s proposed life of George Fox (1624–1691; DNB), founder of the Religious Society of Friends.

Horace Walpole Bedford (c. 1776-1807): Civil servant and miscellaneous writer. The younger brother of Grosvenor Charles Bedford and named after his father’s patron. He was educated at Westminster School (adm. 1784), where his nickname was ‘the Doctor’ or ‘Dr. Johnson’. He did not attend university and later held a post at the British Museum. Like his older brother, he did not marry. Southey’s friendship with Horace began at school and their correspondence (though occasionally intermittent) lasted until at least 1797.

Henry ('Harry') Bedford (c. 1782–1844): A Clerk in the Admiralty from 1804, rising to First Class Clerk in 1826–1844. He was often referred to by Southey as ‘the Master of the Rolls’ or ‘the Magister Rotulorum’. Henry was the only one of the Bedford brothers not to remain single. In 1826 he married Eliza Hore (dates unknown), a widow with three children. The couple had two further children, Henry–Charles–Grosvenor Bedford (1827–1880), who became a civil servant, like his father and two uncles, and Mary–Frances Bedford (1829–1885).

Grosvenor Charles Bedford (1773-1839): Civil servant and miscellaneous writer. The son of Charles Bedford (Deputy Usher of the Exchequer, as Horace Walpole’s substitute). Educated at Westminster School (adm. 1784), but did not attend university. Assistant clerk in the Exchequer Office, 1792–1803; clerk of the cash book, 1803–1806; clerk of the registers and issues, 1806–1822; chief clerk in the auditor’s office, 1822–1834. Admitted to Gray’s Inn, 26 January 1797. Bedford did not marry, despite regularly seeking Southey’s advice on his love affairs.

The Bedford family lived at Westminster and Brixton. The household consisted of the parents, Charles (c. 1742–1814) and Mary Bedford, three sons (Grosvenor, Horace and Harry) and a cousin, Mary Page. Southey was on good terms with the entire family. He made use of the library in their Westminster home and wrote the first draft of Joan of Arc during an extended stay at their house in Brixton in summer 1793. Southey corresponded with Grosvenor and Horace.

Thomas Beddoes (1760-1808): Chemist and physician. Born at Shifnal, Shropshire, son of Richard Beddoes and Ann Whitehall. Educated at Bridgnorth Grammar School, by private tutor, and at Pembroke College, Oxford (matric. 1776, BA 1779, MB and MD 1786), and Edinburgh. Reader in Chemistry at Oxford from 1788. In the early 1790s, a growing reputation as a radical led to his surveillance by Home Office spies and failure to gain the Regius Chair in Chemistry. He left Oxford for Bristol in 1793 and married Anna Edgeworth, sister of the novelist Maria (1768–1849; DNB), in the following year.

Anna Maria Beddoes (1773-1824): Daughter of the Irish educational writer and engineer, Richard Lovell Edgeworth (1744–1817; DNB) and younger sister of the novelist, Maria Edgeworth (1768–1849; DNB). In April 1794 she married Thomas Beddoes, an acquaintance of her father’s. The marriage produced two sons (including the poet, Thomas Lovell Beddoes (1803–1849; DNB) and two daughters but proved unhappy - Anna Maria Beddoes had at least three extra-marital relationships, including with Humphry Davy, and captured the highs and lows of these in her poems.

Lady Margaret Beaumont (née Willes; 1756-1829): Daughter of Sir John Willes (c. 1721–1784), a landowner in Northamptonshire and MP. Her family had literary and artistic interests and she met Sir George Beaumont at a play reading at her home, Astrop Hall, in Northamptonshire. They were married on 6 May 1778. In 1782 a Grand Tour of Europe increased their keen interest in art – both Margaret and her husband sketched and they also painted in oils.

George Howland Beaumont, 7th Baronet (1753-1827): Art patron, landscape painter, and coal mine owner. He was a friend and patron of Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey, Constable and Scott, inviting them to his estate at Coleorton, Leicestershire. Sir George was an enthusiastic amateur painter and owner of many Italian landscapes. Southey first met Beaumont in the Lakes in 1803 and corresponded with him and his wife.