Josiah Walker

Josiah Walker (1761–1831) was a Scottish author, from 1815 Professor of Humanity at Glasgow University.[1] He is known as a biographer of Robert Burns.

Life

Walker was the son of Thomas Walker, minister at Dundonald, and his third wife Annie Shaw. He was educated at Edinburgh High School and Edinburgh University.[1][2][3] At university he formed a group with James Finlayson and George Husband Baird, for extra-curricular linguistic researches.[4] He took notes on Dugald Stewart's course of 1778–9.[5]

After graduating, Walker spent seven years in Edinburgh as a tutor.[6] He joined the Speculative Society in 1783.[7] In 1787 he took the position as tutor to the Marquess of Tullibardine, eldest son of John Murray, 4th Duke of Atholl, and accompanied him to Eton College.[6]

From 1796, Walker was a customs officer in Perth.[7] When the Perth Courier, a Tory newspaper, was set up in 1808, Walker became its editor. He was also involved in the compilation of the Encyclopaedia Perthensis.[6][8] In 1809 he was vice-president of the Literary and Antiquarian Society of Perth.[9]

Walker's biography of Burns. "Miscellaneous Remarks on the Writings of Burns", was published in an 1811 edition of the poems, Poems by Robert Burns with an Account of his Life. It was then printed separately.[10][11] Walker had first met Burns at the Edinburgh house of Thomas Blacklock.[1] They had another encounter at Blair Atholl, and Walker had known Burns in Dumfriesshire, without being a close friend. He drew on and acknowledged the earlier Burns edition by James Currie.[12] The book was put out by the trustees of James Morison (1762–1809) of Perth.[13]

In 1815 Walker became Professor of Humanity at Glasgow University.[13] Among his students was the poet Robert Pollok.[14] George Milligan (died 1856), later minister of Elie, acted as his assistant.[15]

Works

Walker wrote[16] The Defence of Order – A Poem (1802), which defended the policy of William Pitt the Younger and was dedicated to the Duke of Atholl. It sold well, and was attacked by Henry Brougham in the Edinburgh Review.[17]

He also contributed articles to the Encyclopaedia Britannica and Edinburgh Encyclopaedia.[16] Walker has been tentatively identified as involved in Edinburgh Review articles of 1806 and 1811, reviews of religious books.[18]

Family

Walker married in 1795 Margaret Bell, daughter of Richard Bell of Cruvie in Dumfriesshire; they had three sons and a daughter.[13] The eldest son was Thomas Walker M.D. (1796–1886), who practised in Peterborough.[19] The second son Richard Graham Walker practised as a solicitor in Glasgow and Hendon.[13] The youngest son, Josiah (1805–1882), was a graduate of Trinity Hall, Cambridge and cleric.[20] The daughter, Russel (died 1886 at age 89 ), married in 1827 Thomas Grierson, a cousin and minister of Kirkbean.[13]

Notes
  1. Burns, Robert (2014). The Oxford Edition of the Works of Robert Burns. Oxford University Press. p. 361 note 108. ISBN 9780199603176. Retrieved 31 August 2017.
  2. Lindsay, Maurice (1 January 1980). The Burns Encyclopedia. St Martin's Press. p. 368. ISBN 9780709183235.
  3. Steven, William (1849). The History of the High School of Edinburgh. p. 212. Retrieved 31 August 2017.
  4. Curthoys, M. C. "Baird, George Husband". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/1099. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  5. Garrett, Aaron; Harris, James Anthony (2015). Scottish Philosophy in the Eighteenth Century: Morals, Politics, Art, Religion. Oxford University Press. pp. 378 note 42. ISBN 9780199560677. Retrieved 2 September 2017.
  6. Rogers, Charles (1889). "The Book of Robert Burns; genealogical and historical memoirs of the poet, his associates and those celebrated in his writings". Internet Archive. Edinburgh: Printed for the Grampian Club. pp. 304–5. Retrieved 1 September 2017.
  7. Edinburgh, Speculative society of (1845). History of the Speculative Society of Edinburgh. The society. p. 159. Retrieved 1 September 2017.
  8. Chambers, William; Chambers, Robert (1835). Chambers's Edinburgh Journal. W. Orr. p. 194. Retrieved 1 September 2017.
  9. Morison's Perth & Perthshire register. 1809. p. 65.
  10. Stephen, Leslie, ed. (1886). "Burns, Robert (1759-1796)" . Dictionary of National Biography. 7. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
  11. Andrews, Corey E (27 March 2015). The Genius of Scotland: The Cultural Production of Robert Burns, 1785-1834. Hotei Publishing. p. 175. ISBN 9789004294370. Retrieved 2 September 2017.
  12. Franklyn Bliss Snyder, Burns and His Biographers, Studies in Philology Vol. 25, No. 4 (Oct., 1928), pp. 401–415, at p. 409. Published by: University of North Carolina Press. JSTOR 4172010
  13. Rogers, Charles (1889). "The Book of Robert Burns; genealogical and historical memoirs of the poet, his associates and those celebrated in his writings". Internet Archive. Edinburgh: Printed for the Grampian Club. pp. 312–5. Retrieved 1 September 2017.
  14. The British Controversialist and Literary Magazine. Houlston and Stonemen. 1866. p. 120.
  15. Scott, Hew (1950). Fasti ecclesiae scoticanae. Рипол Классик. p. 199. ISBN 9785882268847. Retrieved 2 September 2017.
  16. Watt, Robert (1824). Bibliotheca Britannica: Authors. A. Constable. p. 942. Retrieved 31 August 2017. This source also erroneously credits Walker with having written Monody on the Death of John Thurlow, Esq. (1782) and Ode Addressed to the Society of Universal Good-Will (1785), which are by John Walker (1754-1807).
  17. Rogers, Charles (1889). "The Book of Robert Burns; genealogical and historical memoirs of the poet, his associates and those celebrated in his writings". Internet Archive. Edinburgh: Printed for the Grampian Club. p. 311. Retrieved 1 September 2017.
  18. Irwin Griggs, John D. Kern and Elisabeth Schneider, Early "Edinburgh" Reviewers: A New List, Modern Philology Vol. 43, No. 3 (Feb., 1946), pp. 192–210 at pp. 201 and 209. Published by: The University of Chicago Press. JSTOR 434707
  19. Thos. Walker, M.D., J.P., of Peterborough, The British Medical Journal Vol. 1, No. 1357 (Jan. 1, 1887), pp. 43-44 Published by: BMJ. JSTOR 20210179
  20. "Walker, Josiah (WLKR832J)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
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