Author: Callender, James Thomson
Biography:
CALLENDER, James Thomson (1758-1803: ODNB)
The son of James Callender and his wife (surname formerly Grahame), he was born at Kelso, Roxburghshire, on 8 July 1758. Nothing certain is known about his life before the publication, in Edinburgh, of his crudely satiric Deformities of Samuel Johnson (1782). He followed this with A Critical Review of the Works of Dr. Samuel Johnson in 1783 but unsurprisingly failed to find the patronage that would enable him to pursue a literary career. He trained as a messenger-at-arms but was dismissed from his position in 1790 because of his campaign against his superior. On 18 Sept. 1790 he married Mary Muir (d 1798) in Falkirk, Stirling; they had several children although precise details are wanting. Likely Mary was related to Thomas Muir, the radical writer who was later accused of sedition; he and Callender became drinking partners. Callender was supported by Francis Garden (q.v.) and they worked together with others in Garden’s circle to produce Miscellanies in Prose and Verse. In Feb. 1792 he published the first part of his The Political Progress of Britain in the Edinburgh Bee; the work was later printed as a pamphlet and proved successful but also inflammatory and Callender was forced into exile with his family. They travelled first to Ireland and then to Philadelphia, arriving there in 1793. One son, Thomas, was born there in 1796. Callender worked as a political journalist and supported Thomas Jefferson in opposition to George Washington and the federalists. His The History of the United States for 1796 contributed to destroying Alexander Hamilton’s career when it exposed details about his private life. Once more, however, he took matters too far and his The Prospect Before Us led to his conviction on charges of sedition. He was sentenced in June 1800 to eight months imprisonment and a fine of $200; when Jefferson became president in Feb. 1801 he pardoned Callender which, in practice, meant only that the money was repaid since the prison sentence had already been served. Callender established the Richmond Recorder with Henry Pace, but he was angry that Jefferson had not offered him employment and, in 1802, he published an account of the president’s relationship with his slave, Sally Hemings. Reaction was swift and unforgiving; finding himself ostracised and his newspaper ruined, Callender drowned himself in the James river in Richmond on 17 Apr. 1803. The jury’s verdict was that he had died accidentally while intoxicated but undoubtedly the death was a suicide. (ODNB 25 Feb. 2022; ancestry.co.uk 25 Feb. 2022; Letter to Thomas Jefferson from J. T. Callender, 23 Feb. 1801, Founders Online 25 Feb. 2022; Salem Register 28 July 1803) SR