William Finch-Crisp

Born in Hackney in 1840, he later lived in Erith, Kent, for eleven years before moving to Great Yarmouth at the end of 1854. In 1870 he married Mary Ann, the second daughter of Robert Boyce Crisp, and he remained closely associated with Yarmouth for the rest of his life.

He wrote practical books for the printing and book trades, including business guides for printers, lithographers, engravers, bookbinders, and stationers, as well as a manual on bookbinding. He is now chiefly remembered for Chronological Retrospect of the History of Yarmouth and Neighbourhood, a carefully compiled local history that traces the area from A.D. 46 to 1884.

That Yarmouth history reached multiple expanded editions, and the author noted with pride that a copy and supplement were placed in the principal stone of the town's New Town Hall in 1880. Available records indicate that he died in Great Yarmouth in June 1888, aged 47 or 48.