Digital Victorian Periodical Poetry

Working-class poet and salesman. Pseudonym: James Wilson, druggist, Paisley. Born in Renfrew and orphaned at an early age. Attended parish school and then the University of Glasgow. Worked in a Paisley commission warehouse at age fifteen, at age twenty became a hat salesman for a Glasgow firm, at then started a business for himself that ultimately failed. Lived in London and attempted to earn a living by writing. He was back in Glasgow by 1841, where he continued to try to become a professional writer but suffered worsening financial distress. Author of The Bridegroom and the Bride, and other Poems (1834), Silent Love (1845), Veritas (1849), and Egypt and the East (1856). Biographical information: ODNB. (AC)