John Campbell (author)

Scottish author

John Campbell (8 March 1708 – 28 December 1775) was a Scottish author. He contributed to George Sale's Universal History, and wrote a Political Survey of Britain (1774). He was both prolific and well paid: according to James Boswell, Samuel Johnson spoke of Campbell to Joseph Warton as 'the richest author that ever grazed the common of literature.'

He was the son of a Campbell of Glenlyon, captain in a regiment of horse, and was born in Edinburgh on 8 March 1708. At the age of five he was taken to Windsor by his mother, originally of that town, and educated under the direction of an uncle, who placed him as a clerk in an attorney's office. He left the law for literature, in the 1730s. The work was translated into German, and three other editions of it were published in Campbell's lifetime. After his death there were several more, with continuations, an abridgement appearing in 1870.

To the first Biographia Britannica, the issue of which in weekly numbers began in 1745, Campbell's contributions, signed E. and X., were copious; but they ceased with the publication of vol. iv. Among them were biographies of members of noble British families. In 1750 there appeared, mainly reprinted from a periodical, 'The Museum,' his work The Political State of Europe, which went through six editions in his lifetime, and gave him a wide reputation. It consisted of summaries of the history of the most prominent European states, with remarks on their international relations, and on the policy of their rulers and governments.

A Full and Particular Description of the Highlands of Scotland, its Situation and Produce, the Manners and Customs of the Natives (1752) contained a highly coloured account of the highlanders and of the resources of the Scottish Highlands. After the Peace of Paris, 1763, he wrote, at Lord Bute's request, a Description and History of the new Sugar Islands in the West Indies, to show the value of those which had been ceded by the French at the close of the Seven Years' War. In 1774 appeared his last work, A Political Survey of Great Britain, being a series of reflections on the situation, lands, inhabitants, revenues, colonies, and commerce of the island (2 vols. London, 1774). It mentions projects for the construction of harbours, the opening up of new communications by road and canal, and the introduction of new industries. Campbell proposed that the state should buy up all the waste lands of the country and develop their latent resources, arable and pastoral. Many years had been spent in its preparation, and some of the original subscribers were dead before it appeared. The memoir of Campbell in Andrew Kippis's Biographia Britannica gives a list including further writings.