• Name: Hill, (Thomas)
• Gender: Unknown
• Birth Date: 1760
• Death Date: 20  December  1840

Thomas Hill, is mentioned in the Lamb biography and mixed in contemporary literary circles. See the account below from Thornbury and Walford's Old and New London, vol. 6 (1878). It notes Hill's connections in the literary and theatrical worlds and given that many of the entries are with theatrical figures and/or occur in the playhouse, the identification is extremely likely. He also appears in Godwin's diary with figures associated with him below and in the DNB. A letter from Thomas Hill to Godwin from July 1801 coincides with the beginning of regular appearances of Hill in the diary.

'Thomas Hill, whom we have mentioned above, was a well-known man in his day and generation. He was an eccentric drysalter in the City, who, gathering around him Horace and James Smith, John and Leigh Hunt, George Colman, Campbell, Theodore Hook, Barnes, Mathews, Redding, and a knot of literary acquaintances, set up in the days of the Regency as a sort of City Mæcenas. He was something of an antiquary; knew everybody, and apparently everything about everybody; and was always bustling about the offices of the newspapers and magazines. Poole, the author of "Paul Pry," is said to have drawn that character from him. He was a sort of walking chronicle, especially where literary men and newspapers were concerned. It was once said of him that if he stood at Charing Cross at noonday, he would tell the name and business of everybody that passed Northumberland House. Mathews always declared "Tom Hill," as he was called by all who loved him, one of the oldest men he knew; and a writer in the "Railway Anecdote Book" thus speaks of him:—"Mr. Hill was the Hull of his friend Mr Theodore Hook's clever novel of 'Gilbert Gurney,' beyond comparison the best book of its class produced in our time. It is also related that Hill furnished Mr. Poole with the original of his humorous character of 'Paul Pry;' but this statement is very doubtful, for 'Paul Pry,' if we mistake not, is of French extraction. It is, however, more certain that 'Pooh, pooh!' and other habitual expressions of Mr. Hill's, may have been introduced by Mr. Poole into the character. Mr. Hill, it may here be added, had the entrée to both Houses of Parliament, the theatres, and almost all places of public resort. He was to be met with at the private view of the Royal Academy, and every kind of exhibition. So especially was he favoured, that it was recorded by a wag that, when asked whether he had seen the new comet, he replied, 'Pooh, pooh! I was present at the private view!' Mr. Hill, to borrow from Mr. Hook's portrait, 'happened to know everything that was going forward in all circles—mercantile, political, fashionable, literary, or theatrical; in addition to all matters connected with military and naval affairs, agriculture, finance, art, and science—everything came alike to him.'"

'Hill established the Monthly Mirror, which brought him much into connection with dramatic poets, actors, and managers. To this periodical Kirke White became a contributor; and this encouragement induced him, about the close of the year 1802, to commit a little volume of poetry to the press. Southey, in his Life of Kirke White, refers to Mr. Hill as possessing one of the most copious collections of English poetry in existence.'

While living at Sydenham (prior to 1810), Mr. Hill received his numerous visitors in magnificent style. On one occasion some of the party had to walk to Dulwich to get a conveyance to town. Campbell accompanied his friends. When they separated it was with hats off and three boisterous cheers, "Campbell snatching off his hat," says Cyrus Redding , "not wisely, but too well, pulled off his wig with it, and then, to enhance the merriment upon the occasion, flung both up in the air amidst unbridled laughter." Mr. Adolphus was intimate with Hill for upwards of forty years, and spoke of him as looking fresh and youthful to the last. With reference to his cottage at Sydenham, Mr. Adolphus remarks: "I have dined there with Campbell, James Smith, Jack Johnstone, Mathews, and other celebrities. Burgundy and champagne were given in abundance, and at that time, owing to the state of the war, they were of enormous price—I believe a guinea a bottle." As was to be expected, Hill's affairs soon became deranged, and he was made a bankrupt. His fine library was not sold by auction, but by private contract to Messrs. Longman and Co., and formed the ground-work of that collection of which they published a catalogue, under the title of Bibliotheca Poetica Anglicana. He died in chambers in the Adelphi, at the age of eighty-one, in the year 1840, leaving a fortune of £15,000 to a stray friend who used to dine with him on Sundays at Hampstead. '

• MS. Abinger c. 7, fols. 45r-46v.
• DNB
• George Walter Thornbury and Edward Walford, Old and New London: A Narrative of its History, its People and its Places (London, 1879-85).

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