William Woodfall was an English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 printer

Printing

Printing is a process for reproducing text and image, typically with ink on paper using a printing press. It is often carried out as a large-scale industrial process, and is an essential part of publishing and transaction printing....

 and publisher

Publishing

Publishing is the process of production and dissemination of literature or information—the activity of making information available to the general public...

 in the 18th century.

William's father, Henry Woodfall, printed and published the Public Advertiser

Public Advertiser

The Public Advertiser was a London newspaper in the 18th century.The Public Advertiser was originally known as the London Daily Post and General Advertiser, then simply the General Advertiser consisting more or less exclusively of adverts. It was taken over by its printer, Henry Woodfall, and...

. William served an apprenticeship

Apprenticeship

Apprenticeship is a system of training a new generation of practitioners of a skill. Apprentices or protégés build their careers from apprenticeships...

 with him after attending St. Paul's School, London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, and Tonbridge School

Tonbridge School

Tonbridge School is a British boys' independent school for both boarding and day pupils in Tonbridge, Kent, founded in 1553 by Sir Andrew Judd . It is a member of the Eton Group, and has close links with the Worshipful Company of Skinners, one of the oldest London livery companies...

, where his nickname was "Memory Woodfall".

Following his father's retirement, Woodfall shared the running of the Public Advertiser with his brother Henry Sampson Woodfall

Henry Sampson Woodfall

Henry Sampson Woodfall was an English printer and journalist. He was born and lived in London.His father, Henrsamsll s the printer of the newspaper the Public Advertiser, and the author of the ballad Darby and Joan, for which his son's employer, John Darby, and his wife, were the originals...

. In 1769 Woodfall he founded the Morning Chronicle

Morning Chronicle

The Morning Chronicle was a newspaper founded in 1769 in London, England, and published under various owners until 1862. It was most notable for having been the first employer of Charles Dickens, and for publishing the articles by Henry Mayhew which were collected and published in book format in...

which pioneered reporting Parliament

Parliament of the United Kingdom

The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body in the United Kingdom, British Crown dependencies and British overseas territories, located in London...

ary debates. Because of the ban on note-taking in the House of Commons

British House of Commons

The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...

, he had memorised what was said, writing it down afterwards.

On several occasions Woodfall's reporting was controversial. Edmund Burke

Edmund Burke

Edmund Burke PC was an Irish statesman, author, orator, political theorist and philosopher who, after moving to England, served for many years in the House of Commons of Great Britain as a member of the Whig party....

 sued him for libel and in 1779 Woodfall was found guilty of printing and publishing a leaflet supporting the acquittal of Admiral Augustus Keppell

Augustus Keppel, 1st Viscount Keppel

Admiral Augustus Keppel, 1st Viscount Keppel PC was an officer of the Royal Navy during the Seven Years' War and the War of American Independence...

. He was sentenced to twelve months in Newgate Prison

Newgate Prison

Newgate Prison was a prison in London, at the corner of Newgate Street and Old Bailey just inside the City of London. It was originally located at the site of a gate in the Roman London Wall. The gate/prison was rebuilt in the 12th century, and demolished in 1777...

.

In 1789 he passed control of The Morning Chronicle to James Perry and relinquished control of The Public Advertiser in 1793.

External links

• Spartacus article on William Woodfall
• Hannah Barker, ‘Woodfall, William (bap. 1745, d. 1803)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004, accessed 19 Dec 2007