23 Facts About Francis Thompson

Francis Joseph Thompson was an English poet and Catholic mystic.

Francis Thompson spent three years on the streets of London, supporting himself with menial labour, becoming addicted to opium which he took to relieve a nervous problem.

Francis Thompson's father, Charles, was a doctor who had converted to Roman Catholicism, following his brother Edward Healy Thompson, a friend of Cardinal Manning.

Francis Thompson had a brother who died in infancy, and three younger sisters.

At the age of eleven, Francis Thompson was sent to Ushaw College, a Catholic seminary near Durham.

Francis Thompson could be recognised from afar along an 'ambulacrum' or corridor by his habit of sidling sheepishly along the wall with the collar of his coat turned up.

Francis Thompson had no interest in Mathematics and, in his final exam, he came last.

Francis Thompson became a connoisseur of cricket though he rarely participated.

Francis Thompson studied medicine for nearly eight years at Owens College, now the University of Manchester.

Francis Thompson never practised as a doctor, and tried to enlist as a soldier but was rejected for his slightness of stature.

Francis Thompson lived on the streets of Charing Cross and slept by the River Thames, with the homeless and other addicts.

Francis Thompson was turned down by Oxford University, not because he was unqualified, but because of his addiction.

Francis Thompson contemplated suicide in his nadir of despair, but was saved from completing the action through a vision which he believed to be that of a youthful poet Thomas Chatterton, who had committed suicide over a century earlier.

Francis Thompson later described her in his poetry as his saviour.

Francis Thompson was sought out by the magazine's editors, Wilfrid and Alice Meynell, who recognised the value of his work.

Francis Thompson continued to take opium but in small doses at irregular intervals, to relieve nerve pain.

Francis Thompson struck up a good relationship with the Meynells who, parents and children, furnished inspiration for some of his poetry.

Francis Thompson's verse continued to elicit high praise from critics right up to his last volume in 1897.

Francis Thompson's selected poems published in 1908 contains about 50 pieces in all.

Francis Thompson moved around frequently, subsequently living near Pantasaph, Flintshire, in Wales and at Storrington.

Francis Thompson died from tuberculosis at the age of 47, in the Hospital of St John and St Elizabeth, and is buried in St Mary's Roman Catholic Cemetery in Kensal Green.

Francis Thompson wrote The Poppy, Sister Songs, New Poems, and a posthumously published essay, Shelley.

In 2012, Chris Ward's biographical filmscript, Hound: Visions in the Life of the Victorian poet Francis Thompson was staged at the Riverside Studios, Hammersmith and following that the stage version was taken on a tour of London's churches including St Giles-in-the Fields and in St Olav's in May 2014.