Montgomery Crompton

Author of Life as a God.

He was a British soldier and artist, and a member of the landed gentry in England. Dispatched to Egypt under Sir Ralph Abercrombie.

Article from the Manchester Guardian about an 1853 fire at the Lancaster Royal Grammar School:

“…the fire began in an attic area dedicated to the storage of excess equipment and other materials as of yet unused by the school in its new location. One peculiar item lost in the fire was an unfinished bronze bust of an Egyptian pharaoh by an Old Lancastrian, one Lt. M. Crompton. A veteran of the Egyptian campaign against Napoleon, he bequeathed the bust to the school before his death in 1811. The bust, bearing an elaborate and complete headdress but lacking a finished face, was a figure of schoolboy rumour, as it was considered good luck to rub the beard before examinations. Apparently, the heat of the fire was of such a degree that the bronze bust was fully melted. Of the two boys killed in the fire, it would appear that they started the conflagration, no doubt accidentally while exploring the apparently unlocked rooms. It is without a doubt that negligence on the part of the school staff led to this oversight.”