• Name: Williams, John Henry
• Gender: Male
• Birth Date:
• Death Date: 12  May  1829
• Occupation: Church of England clergyman
• Occupation: peace advocate

Godwin enters I H Williams (sic) on the 1796 list under 1794 and Colin Haydon's biography of John Henry Williams, who had just achieved some degree of renown by preaching and publishing on an end to war with revolutionary France identifies this as a meeting between Godwin and Williams. Godwin read Williams' sermonds in the spring and early summer of this year.

'.... soon Godwin ingratiated himself with Parr; and, in October 1794, Godwin and the Doctor came to Wellesbourne and dined with Williams at the parsonage. That dinner, at which Godwin and Parr debated about passions and reasoning, symbolized how considerably Williams' life had changed following his decision to publish his anti-war sermons. And, again, one wonders whether the Vicar of Wellesbourne was entirely pleased.' (p. 114)

This corresponds with 11 October 1794, when Godwin is in Warwickshire, 'dine at Williams’s; talk of culprits & passions; Parr admits that reasoning always precedes volition, &:'

Also following Hayden, the 1 November 1794, Thomas Hardy's trial, has been coded though Hayden's reasoning for this is less strong ('Perhaps he persuaded Williams to attend at least the opening of Hardy's trial on 28 October: in his frustratingly terse diary, he recorded 'See ... Williams' there. That this was indeed John Henry Williams appears very likely, considering Williams' political sentiments...', p. 117).

On 5 June 1797, when Godwin enters 'Welsburn' on a tour of the area, Haydon suggests that this may indicate a meeting with Williams, who was vicar of Wellesbourne and had just secured a signigicant victory at a country meeting where an anti-war petition had been adopted in the face of opposition from supporters of Pitt (p. 126).

• DNB
• Colin Haydon, John Henry Williams (1747-1829), “political clergyman”: War, the French Revolution, and the Church of England (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2007).

This table lists the people this person is most frequently noted with in the diary.