Life

The only son of Joseph Dodson, dissenting minister at Marlborough, Wiltshire, he was born there in September 1732. He was educated at Marlborough grammar school

Grammar school

A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and some other English-speaking countries, originally a school teaching classical languages but more recently an academically-oriented secondary school.The original purpose of mediaeval...

, and then, in accordance with the advice of Sir Michael Foster, justice of the king's bench

King's Bench

The Queen's Bench is the superior court in a number of jurisdictions within some of the Commonwealth realms...

, was entered at the Middle Temple

Middle Temple

The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers; the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn and Lincoln's Inn...

 31 August 1754. He practised for many years as a special pleader; and was finally called to the bar on 4 July 1783. In 1770 he had been appointed one of the commissioners of bankruptcy. This post he held till his death, at his house, Boswell Court, Carey Street, 13 November 1799. In 1778 Dodson married his cousin, Elizabeth Hawkes of Marlborough.

Works

Dodson's legal writings were an edition with notes and references of Sir Michael Foster's Report of some Proceedings on the Commission for the Trial of Rebels in the year 1746 in the County of Surrey, and of other crown cases

Foster's Crown Law

A Report of Some Proceedings on the Commission for the Trial of the Rebels in the Year 1746, in the County of Surry; And of Other Crown Cases: to which are Added Discourses Upon a Few Branches of the Crown Law, usually called simply Crown Law or Crown Cases, is an influential treatise on the...

(3rd edition 1792). In 1795 Dodson wrote a Life of Sir Michael Foster. This, originally intended for the new edition of the Biographia Britannica

Biographia Britannica

Biographia Britannica was a multi-volume biographical compendium, "the most ambitious attempt in the latter half of the eighteenth century to document the lives of notable British men and women". The first edition, edited by William Oldys, appeared in 6 volumes between 1747 and 1766...

, was published in 1811 with a preface by John Disney

John Disney (Unitarian)

John Disney was an English Unitarian minister and biographical writer, initially an Anglican clergyman active against subscription to the Thirty Nine Articles.-Life:...

.

Dodson, a Unitarian

Unitarianism

Unitarianism is a Christian theological movement, named for its understanding of God as one person, in direct contrast to Trinitarianism which defines God as three persons coexisting consubstantially as one in being....

, published A New Translation of Isaiah, with Notes Supplementary to those of Dr. Louth, late Bishop of London. By a Layman. This led to a controversy with Dr. Sturges, nephew of Robert Lowth

Robert Lowth

Robert Lowth FRS was a Bishop of the Church of England, Oxford Professor of Poetry and the author of one of the most influential textbooks of English grammar.-Life:...

, who replied in Short Remarks (1791), and was in turn answered by Dodson in a Letter to the Rev. Dr. Sturges, Author of “Short Remarks,” on a New Translation of Isaiah. Dodson wrote some other theological tracts.