1679       

21st. January Tuesday
Nathaniel Paget, M.D., died in January. He was the son of Rev. Thomas Paget, incumbent of Blackley and rector of Stockport, in Cheshire, but was born in Manchester. He was M.A. Edinburgh, but proceeded M.D. at Leyden 3rd August, 1639, and was incorporated at Cambridge on his Leyden degree 3rd. June, 1642; and then settled in London. He was dead on the 21st January, 1678-9. (Munk’s Roll of the Royal College of Physicians, vol. i., p. 224.)(7)

1679
Several pamphlets published about Charles Bennet, a child three years old, who, it is asserted, “did speak Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, though never taught these languages, and at his own earnest request was taken from Manchester to be introduced to the King.” Nothing more is known of this infant Mezzofanti.(7)

1679
Sarah, Duchess of Somerset, appoints by her will sixteen scholarships in Brazenose College, Oxford, and the same number in St. John’s College, Cambridge, and directed that the scholarships should be elected by turns for ever out of Manchester School and the free schools of Hereford and Marlborough. She was the second daughter of Sir Edward Alston, Kt. She married, firstly, George Grimston, eldest son of Sir Harbottle Grimston, of Bradfield, Essex, Bart. He died in 1655, before his father, and his widow was married to John Seymour, fourth Duke of Somerset, who died 1675. The Duchess of Somerset then married Henry Hare, Lord Coleraine, by whom she was survived. She had no issue, and was buried in Westminster Abbey November 2, 1692. She left her property principally in charities. The residue went to her eldest sister’s grandson, the Hon. Langham Booth, son of the Earl of Warrington. (See Hibbert-Ware’s Foundations, vol. iii.) Le Neve says that she lived apart from Lord Coleraine severall years, being of a covetous humour, and left nothing to the Lord Coleraine.(7)