Home to Thomas de Quincey from 1820-1825. De Quincey was an essayist and journalist and briefly (1816 -1819) editor of the Westmorland Gazette. A staunch anti-slavery abolitionist he is perhaps best remembered for his ‘Confessions of an English Opium Eater’, a book that influenced Hector Berlioz composer of the ‘Symphonie Fantastique’.
