Henry Skillicorne (c1678-1763) was a Manx-born merchant mariner who after some four decades trading out of Bristol began a second career as the first serious developer of the spa waters in Cheltenham. Regarded as 'the founder of Cheltenham as a watering place' in all the standard histories of the town, his memorial inscription in the parish church, standing at 53 lines and almost 600 words, is one of the longest in Britain, and has been transcribed and reproduced many times.