Author: Douglas, Robert Kelly
Biography:
DOUGLAS, Robert Kelly (1785-1855: ancestry.co.uk)
He was born in Edinburgh on 2 Nov. 1785 to John Douglas and his wife Isobella Simpson, and baptised at St. Cuthbert's on 2 Dec. Nothing is known about his education but the dedication to John Gibson Lockhart in his Poems and Songs identifies him as a friend and "fellow-student." Possibly they had studied at the University of Glasgow together. On 21 Nov. 1809 he married Elizabeth Watson at Haddington, East Lothian; they seem not to have had children. It is likely that Douglas was working as a schoolmaster when his A Concise History of the Bible, intended for use in schools, was published in 1817. By 1827 when he wrote a letter to Walter Scott (q.v.) he was living in London's Covent Garden and employed as the editor of the New Times. The next sighting of him is in Birmingham where he was living at the time of the 1841 Census which gives his occupation as 'Editor." The 1851 Census also records him as present in Birmingham but only as a visitor at the home of a surgeon; Douglas is identified as a widower and as "Registrar of the Borough Court." However, he was in Edinburgh when he died on 22 Jan. 1855 and he was buried on 29 Jan. in the Edinburgh Southern Cemetery. His one book of verse includes imiatations of Horace and Anacreon (qq.v.) and songs in dialect. (He is not to be confused with Robert Kennaway Douglas, a priminent scholar of Chinese language and culture later in the nineteenth century; some catalogues refer to both men as R. K. Douglas or Robert K. Douglas.) (ancestry.co.uk 6 Nov. 2025; findmypast.co.uk 6 Nov. 2025; Letter to Walter Scott, NLS MS 3905, ff. 104-05) SR
Other Names:
- R. K. Douglas