Michael Tyson

Michael Tyson (1740–1780) was an English Anglican priest, academic, antiquary, and artist.

Life He was born in Stamford, Lincolnshire on 19 November 1740, the only child of Michael Tyson (d. 22 February 1794, aged 83), dean of Stamford and archdeacon of Huntingdon, by his first wife, Elizabeth Curtis of Woolsthorpe, Lincolnshire. He entered Corpus Christi College, Cambridge in 1759, became a scholar, and studied Greek under the Rev. John Cowper, brother of William Cowper, the poet. He graduated B.A. (11th Wrangler) in 1764, M.A. in 1767, and B.D. in 1775, and in 1767 was elected to a fellowship at his college.

In the autumn of 1766 Tyson accompanied Richard Gough in a tour, of which he kept a journal, through the north of England and Scotland; during the journey he was made a burgess of Glasgow (12 September 1766) and of Inverary (17 September) He returned to residence at college, and devoted himself to etching and botany. With Israel Lyons the younger he made trips in search of rare plants around Cambridge. He was also friendly with James Essex, Horace Walpole, Sir John Cullum, 6th Baronet, and Samuel Henley.

Family On 4 July 1778 he was married at St Bene't's Church, Cambridge, to Margaret, daughter of Hitch Wale of Shelford in Cambridgeshire. He left one son, Michael Curtis Tyson (1779–1794), who inherited Elizabeth Curtis' manors of Barholm and Stow-cum-Deeping in Lincolnshire. His widow married, as her second husband, in the autumn of 1784, Isaac Crouch, assistant clerk of the minutes of the custom-house.