Joseph Irving (1830–1891) was a Scottish journalist, historian and annalist.
Life
Born at
Dumfries
Dumfries ( ; sco, Dumfries; from gd, Dùn Phris ) is a market town and former royal burgh within the Dumfries and Galloway council area of Scotland. It is located near the mouth of the River Nith into the Solway Firth about by road from the ...
on 2 May 1830, he was son of Andrew Irving, a joiner. After being educated at the parish school of
Troqueer, over the
River Nith from Dumfries, he served an apprenticeship as a printer in the office of the ''
Dumfries Standard''.
Irving then worked practised as compositor and journalist in Dumfries and
Sunderland
Sunderland () is a port city in Tyne and Wear, England. It is the City of Sunderland's administrative centre and in the Historic counties of England, historic county of County of Durham, Durham. The city is from Newcastle-upon-Tyne and is on t ...
. He was for a time on the staff of the ''
Morning Chronicle
''The Morning Chronicle'' was a newspaper founded in 1769 in London. It was notable for having been the first steady employer of essayist William Hazlitt as a political reporter and the first steady employer of Charles Dickens as a journalist. It ...
'' in London, and in 1854 became editor of the ''Dumbarton Herald''. For some years afterwards he was a bookseller in
Dumbarton, and started in 1867 the ''Dumbarton Journal'', which was unsuccessful.
In 1860 Irving became a fellow of the
Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, and in 1864 an honorary member of the Archæological Society of Glasgow. He disposed of his Dumbarton business in 1869 on the death of his wife, who had been involved with him in his enterprises. After living a few years in
Renton, Dumbartonshire, he settled in
Paisley in 1880, where he wrote for the ''
Glasgow Herald
''The Herald'' is a Scottish broadsheet newspaper founded in 1783. ''The Herald'' is the longest running national newspaper in the world and is the eighth oldest daily paper in the world. The title was simplified from ''The Glasgow Herald'' in ...
'' and other journals.
After some years of uncertain health, Irving died at Paisley, on 2 September 1891.
Works
Irving wrote:
* ''The Conflict at Glenfruin: its Causes and Consequences, being a Chapter of Dumbartonshire History'', 1856.
* ''History of Dumbartonshire from the Earliest Period to the Present Time'', 1857; 2nd edit. 1859.
* ''The Drowned Women of Wigtown: a Romance of the Covenant'', 1862.
* ''The Annals of our Time from the Accession of Queen Victoria to the Opening of the present Parliament'', 1869 (new edit. 1871), with two supplements from February 1871 to 19 March 1874, and from 20 March 1874 to the occupation of Cyprus, published respectively in 1875 and 1879; a further continuation brought the record from 1879 down to the jubilee of 1887 (Lond. 1889). J. Hamilton Fyfe undertook a later supplement. The ''Annals'' became a standard work of reference.
* ''The Book of Dumbartonshire: a History of the County, Burghs, Parishes, and Lands, Memoirs of Families, and Notices of Industries'', 3 vols., 1879.
*
The Book of Eminent Scotsmen', 1882.
* ''The West of Scotland in History'', 1885.
He also published: ''Memoir of the Smolletts of Bonhill''; ''Memoir of the Dennistouns of Dennistoun'', 1859; and ''Dumbarton Burgh Records, 1627–1746'', 1860; and an substantive paper on the "Origin and Progress of Burghs in Scotland", in the ''Transactions'' of the Archæological Society of Glasgow.
Notes
Attribution
External links
*
1830 births
1891 deaths
Scottish journalists
Scottish antiquarians
People from Dumfries
Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland