Drake
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Drake
DRAKE, FRANCIS (1696–1771), author of `Eboracum,' the son of the Rev. Francis Drake, vicar of Pontefract and prebendary of York, by his second wife, Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of John Dickson of Pontefract, was baptised on 22 Jan. 1695-6. He came of an old Yorkshire family of some position. His great-grandfather, Nathan Drake of Godley, Halifax, had borne arms in the service of Charles I, and is known as the author of the manuscript account of the sieges of Pontefract in 1644 and 1645, which was first partly printed in Boothroyd's history of that borough, and since in its integrity by the Surtees Society. As some compensation for the losses he had incurred for his attachment to the royal cause, his son, Dr. Samuel Drake [q. v.], was presented by Charles II to the vicarage of Pontefract, a preferment held by the family during three generations. How or where Francis was educated is not known; in the preface to 'Eboracum' he laments that his share of what he terms 'school-learning' was small, and that he had to make up by painful study for the lack of early training He was apprenticed at an early age to Mr. Christopher Birbeck, a surgeon in large practice at York. In 1713, while still in his articles, he lost his father, who