Born at Bath, Somerset on 10 January 1824, he was the eldest of five sons of Samuel Peace Pratt by his wife Susanna Martha Hodgson (d. 1875). After education at Haileybury College (1844–6), he matriculated at London University in 1844. In 1847 he joined the East India Company's service at Calcutta. He became under-secretary to the government of Bengal, and inspector of public instruction there. While in India Pratt in 1851 helped to found the Vernacular Literature Society which published Bengali translations of English literature, and acted as secretary till 1856. He also started a school of industrial art. In 1857 Pratt was at home on leave and at contributed to The Economist on Indian matters. He finally left India in 1861.[2]
Pratt was a champion of international arbitration. On the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 he pleaded for the peaceful settlement of the dispute. Two years later he joined in an appeal for the release of Élisée Reclus who had taken part in the Paris Commune. In 1880 he joined William Phillips and others in founding the International Arbitration and Peace Association, becoming first chairman of the executive committee. Four years later (1 July 1884) he founded, and initially edited, the association's Journal (later Concord). On behalf of the association he travelled in Europe, and he took part in international peace congresses at Paris and elsewhere from 1889 onwards.[2]
Last years
Friends nominated Pratt for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1906, when it went to Theodore Roosevelt. He had become a convinced socialist suffered from poor eyesight, and spent the last years of his life at Le Pecq. Seine et Oise, France, where he died on 26 February 1907. He is buried on the main north-south path of the eastern side of Highgate Cemetery. Jeremy Beadle has since been buried immediately in front of his memorial.
The Annual Hodgson Pratt Memorial Lecture and travelling scholarship for working men, as well as prizes, were established in 1911.[2]
Works
For the International Arbitration and Peace Association, Pratt translated Élie Ducommun's The Programme of the Peace Movement (1896) and he summarised in English as The Organisation of International Arbitration (1897) a work of Édouard Descamps.[2]