George Ballard (biographer)

George Ballard (c. 1706 – June 1755) was an English antiquary and biographer, the author of Memoirs of Several Ladies of Great Britain (1752).

Self-educated, Ballard taught himself Anglo-Saxon while working in a habit-maker's shop, and attracted the attention of the Saxon scholar Elizabeth Elstob.

Lord Chedworth and other local gentlemen provided him with an annuity of £60 a year, enabling Ballard to move to Oxford to use the Bodleian Library.

Dr. Jenner appointed him a clerk of Magdalen College, Oxford, and he subsequently became a university beadle.

Ballard died young, and his only printed publication was Memoirs of several ladies of Great Britain, who have been celebrated for their writings, or skill in the learned languages, arts and sciences (Oxford: W. Jackson, 1752).