Life

He was born in Bristol

Bristol

Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...

, the son of a wealthy Quaker, and probably followed some business. He estranged himself from his original circle by marrying, in 1794, Mary Fricker, a girl of much beauty and some talent, who had gone on the stage. He made Robert Southey

Robert Southey

Robert Southey was an English poet of the Romantic school, one of the so-called "Lake Poets", and Poet Laureate for 30 years from 1813 to his death in 1843...

's acquaintance, and Southey became engaged to his sister-in-law, Edith; this was before Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...

's visit to Bristol in August 1794. Lovell introduced the two poets to their patron Joseph Cottle

Joseph Cottle

Joseph Cottle was a publisher and author.Cottle started business in Bristol. He published the works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey on generous terms...

, and shortly Coleridge was betrothed to a third sister, Sara Fricker, whom he married on 14 Nov. 1795.

The three young men were at that time occupied with the project for their pantisocratic colony on the banks of the Susquehanna River

Susquehanna River

The Susquehanna River is a river located in the northeastern United States. At long, it is the longest river on the American east coast that drains into the Atlantic Ocean, and with its watershed it is the 16th largest river in the United States, and the longest river in the continental United...

, to which Lovell was to have brought not only his wife but his brother and two sisters. The plan had largely collapsed before Lovell's death in April 1796 from a fever. Edith Southey, in Southey's absence, nursed him.

Family matters

Lovell's father refused all help to his daughter-in-law Mary on the grounds of her having been an actress, and she and her infant son turned to Southey for support. She lived in his family during his life, and afterwards with his daughter Kate until her death at the age of ninety. The son, Robert Lovell the younger, settled in London as a printer in 1824. Some years afterwards he went to Italy and then disappeared. Henry Nelson Coleridge

Henry Nelson Coleridge

Henry Nelson Coleridge was an editor of the works of his uncle Samuel Taylor Coleridge.Henry's father was Captain James Coleridge, the poet's brother. While a chancery barrister, Henry married Samuel's daughter Sara in 1829. He was a great admirer of his uncle and father-in-law...

 journeyed in quest of him, but no trace was discovered.

Works

In August 1794 Lovell co-operated Coleridge and Southey in the production of a three-act tragedy on The Fall of Robespierre

The Fall of Robespierre

The Fall of Robespierre is a three-act play written by Robert Southey and Samuel Coleridge in 1794. It follows the events in France after the downfall of Maximilien Robespierre. Robespierre is portrayed as a tyrant, but Southey's contributions praise him as a destroyer of despotism...

. Each wrote an act, but Lovell's was then rejected as incompatible with the others, and Southey filled the void. The tragedy was published as Coleridge's at Cambridge in September 1794.

Southey and Lovell then combined to publish a joint volume of poetry (Bristol, 1794; Bath, 1795) under the title of Poems by Bion and Moschus; the Bath edition bears the authors' names. Southey later wished none of these poems reprinted; but they were in Thomas Park

Thomas Park (antiquarian)

Thomas Park was an English antiquary and bibliographer, also known as a literary editor.-Life:He was the son of parents who lived at East Acton, Middlesex...

's British Poets (1808 sq. vol. xli.), with the addition of the Bristoliad by Lovell which does not seem to have been published before. The Bristoliad was a satire in Charles Churchill's style, and indicates that Lovell was ill at ease in the commercial atmosphere of Bristol.