Jane Davy (1780-1855): Wealthy widow, socialite and distant cousin of Walter Scott. She married Humphry Davy on 11 April 1812.

James William Dodd (?1759/60–1818): An Usher at Westminster School from 1784.

Thomas Frognall Dibdin (1776–1847): Clergyman and bibliographer. He and Southey met at a dinner given by Longman, the publisher. Dibdin sent the Poet Laureate a copy of his expensive and lavishly illustrated Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany (1821). This courtesy initiated a spasmodic correspondence between the two men on literary matters.

Isaac D’Israeli (1766–1848): Son of Benjamin Disraeli (1730–1816), a wealthy Italian-Jewish merchant. Isaac devoted his life to his library and miscellaneous literary works, most famously his Curiosities of Literature (1791). He corresponded with Southey on literary subjects on an intermittent basis, and dedicated the fourth edition of his The Literary Character; or the History of Men of Genius (1828) to him. Southey praised his good nature, but thought him a mixture of knowledge and ignorance.

John Dawes (c. 1765-1845): Perpetual Curate of Ambleside, 1805–1845, and schoolmaster. His pupils included Hartley and Derwent Coleridge.

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.

Thomas De Quincey (1785-1859): Writer, essayist and literary critic, best known for his Confessions of an English Opium-Eater (1821). De Quincey was the son of a successful merchant and was born in Manchester. A brilliant scholar as a child, his schooling was erratic, and though he entered Worcester College, Oxford in 1803, he did not take his degree. A passionate admirer of Wordsworth and Coleridge, he lived at Wordsworth’s former home, Dove Cottage, Grasmere, from 1809–1819, when he came to know Southey. De Quincey married Margaret Simpson (d.

Francis Douce (1757–1834): English antiquarian and Keeper of Manuscripts at the British Museum 1799–1811. Southey reviewed Douce’s Illustrations of Shakespeare and Ancient Manners (1807) and sent him some suggestions for further notes on obscure phrases in Shakespeare’s plays.

John Edmondson (d. 1823): A surgeon and apothecary in Keswick, who treated the Southey family.

James Dusautoy (c. 1797–1815): Son of a retired officer from Totnes, Devon. He cherished ambitions for a poetic career. As a schoolboy in 1811 he canvassed Walter Scott’s advice and was politely encouraged to improve his writing by gaining more knowledge. In 1813 Dusautoy sent some of his verses to Southey. The latter replied and a correspondence about Dusautoy’s career ensued. He took Southey’s advice and was admitted to Emmanuel College, Cambridge, in 1813. In 1814 he entered an ode, in Spenserian stanzas, for a university prize in English poetry.