Author: Johnston, Charles
Biography:
JOHNSTON, Charles (1791-1823: ancestry.co.uk)
He was born on 25 Mar. 1791 and baptised on 24 May at St. George’s, Bloomsbury, the eldest son of John Johnston (1745-1828), a Captain in the 62nd Regiment of Foot, later a merchant, and his wife Anna Smyth (1767-1860), who had married at Childwall, Lancashire, in 1790. After the army his father went into partnership with his brother Hugh, a corn merchant and banker with trading interests in Europe and Tobago. The business flourished and in 1807 John Johnston bought Danson Hall and Park, a fine Palladian Villa in Bexley which can still be visited. At his death he left £120,000. Charles went up to Trinity College Cambridge in 1807 (BA 1818) and probably entered the family firm. He travelled extensively in Europe, visiting the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Italy. He also went to Madeira, Portugal, probably on family business, and wrote a series of sonnets on the voyage home. He died, probably from consumption, on 9 Feb. 1823 and was buried at St. Mary the Virgin, Bexley, Kent, aged 31. His sonnets and translations were edited by his maternal uncle, the poet and historian William Smyth (1765-1849), who also included a portrait. He probably brought them to the attention of Joanna Baillie (q.v.), who printed several on Johnston's sonnets in her Collection of Poems, Chiefly Manuscript (1823). (ancestry.co.uk 4 Jan. 2022; findmypast.co.uk 4 Jan. 2022; "Smyth, William," ODNB 4 Jan. 2022; LBS; Morning Chronicle 13 Feb. 1823, 8 Dec. 1823, 29 Dec. 1828) AA