Author: Beattie, William
Biography:
BEATTIE, William (1793-1875: ODNB)
The ODNB identifies Beattie as a physician and poet; he was also a travel writer, biographer, and loyal friend. He was born in Dalton, Annandale, to James and Janet Beattie, and baptised on 23 Feb. 1793. His father was an architect and surveyor who died in 1809 after an accident. Beattie was educated from the age of fourteen at Clarencefield Academy, Dumfriesshire, before entering Edinburgh University in 1813. He graduated MD in 1818 with a dissertation on pulmonary phthisis and remained living in Edinburgh for several years, working as a teacher and running a small private practice. In 1820 he moved to Cumberland and in 1822 he went to London where, on 11 Apr. 1822, he married Elizabeth Limner (d 1845) in St. George’s, Hanover Sq.; they had no children. Beattie attended the Duke of Clarence (the future William IV) and his family to the courts of Germany in 1822, 1824, and 1826. He made the most of the opportunities to travel, visiting Italy and Switzerland. He was paid for his services—including being the Duke’s private secretary—with gifts in lieu of a salary. In 1827 he became a licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians and established a prosperous practice in Hampstead. He also widened his literary circle, becoming friends with Thomas Campbell, the Countess of Blessington, and Samuel Rogers (qq.v.). He travelled to Boulogne to attend Campbell in his final illness in 1844 and was responsible for ensuring not only that Campbell was buried in Poets’ Corner but that a statue of him was erected in Westminster Abbey. Campbell had commissioned Beattie to be his biographer and The Life and Letters of Thomas Campbell was published in three volumes in 1849. W. H. Bartlett, who illustrated many of Beattie’s works, was also a friend and on his death in 1846 Beattie wrote a memoir, donating the profits to Bartlett’s family. He served as secretary to the British Archaeological Society and was a fellow of the Ethnological Society. Beattie died at home in Upper Berkeley St., London, on 17 Mar. 1875. He was buried in Brighton beside his wife. Other works include Journal of a Residence in Germany (1831), Switzerland (1836), The Waldenses (1839), and The Castles and Abbeys of England (1843). An enlarged edition of The Heliotrope was published in about 1845 as The Pilgrim in Italy. (ODNB 11 Mar. 2022; ancestry.co.uk 11 Mar. 2022; Paisley and Renfrewshire Gazette 3 Apr. 1875) SR