John Langford (1750–1804)
John Langford was the son of the Oxford grocer Robert Langford (or Longford) and his wife Elizabeth. His parents owned the house that was the former octagonal chapel at 29 Broad Street in the parish of St Peter-in-the-East, but they appear to have lived in the neighbouring parish of Holywell.
Robert and Elizabeth Longford had the following children:
- Robert (baptised at Holywell Church 31 August 1747, buried there 18 October 1747)
- Robert (baptised at Holywell Church 14 September 1748, buried there 28 October 1750)
- John (baptised at Holywell Church on 20 June 1750)
John's father Robert is probably the man of that name who was buried at Holywell Church on 8 April 1762. Certainly his father was dead by 1765, when his mother Elizabeth is listed as the owner of the former octagonal chapel. In 1780, after John had come of age, the house is described as being owned by "John Langford, surgeon, and Elizabeth Langford, widow", and they continued to let it out.
In April 1767 Langford was apprenticed to the surgeon Charles Nourse for seven years. Soon after the end of his apprenticeship, on 28 July 1775, he was matriculated at the University of Oxford as "Chirurgus". On 4 November 1775 he was elected a surgeon of the Radcliffe Infirmary. It is understood that he practised from 13 Ship Street.
The Universal Business Directory of 1794 lists Langford Rob., Grocer and Tea-dealer and Langford William, Gingerbread-baker: it seems likely that these were John's relations, possibly his brothers.
Langford died (at the age of 54, according to his baptism) on 9 November 1804. Jackson's Oxford Journal published the following day reads:
Yesterday died, in the 54th year of his age, much regretted, Mr. John Langford, an eminent Surgeon of this city.