CAMPBELL, THOMAS Scottish poet, eighth son of Alexander Campbell, was born at Glasgow on July 27 77. His father, who was a cadet of the family of Campbell of Kirnan, Argyllshire, belonged to a Glasgow firm trading in Virginia, and lost his money in consequence of the American war. Campbell was educated at the grammar school and university of his native town. In May 1 797 he went to Edinburgh to attend lectures on law. He supported himself by private teaching and by writing, towards which he was helped by Dr. Robert Anderson, the editor of the British Poets. In 1799, six months after the publication of the Lyrical Ballads of Wordsworth and Coleridge, The Pleas ures of Hope was published. It is a rhetorical and didactic poem in the taste of his time, and owed much to the fact that it dealt with topics near to men's hearts, with the French Revolution, the partition of Poland and negro slavery. Its success was instanta neous, but Campbell did not follow it up. He went abroad in June 1800, visited Klopstock at Hamburg, and made his way to Regensburg, which was taken by the French three days after his arrival. He found refuge in a Scottish monastery. Some of his best poems, ."Hohenlinden," "Ye Mariners of England," and "The Soldier's Dream," belong to his German tour. He spent the winter in Altona, where he met an Irish exile, Anthony Mc Cann, whose history suggested "The Exile of Erin." On the out break of war between Denmark and England he hurried home, the "Battle of the Baltic" being drafted soon after. At Edin burgh he was introduced to the first Lord Minto, who took him in the next year to London as occasional secretary.
In 1803 Campbell married his second cousin, Matilda Sinclair, and settled in London. He was well received in Whig society, espe cially at Holland House. His prospects, however, were slight when in 1805 he received a government pension of £200. Campbell was at this time regularly employed on the Star newspaper, for which he translated the foreign news. In 1809 he published a narrative poem in the Spenserian stanza, "Gertrude of Wyoming," with which were printed some of his best lyrics. He was slow and fastidious in composition, and the poem suffered from over-elabo ration. In 1812 he delivered a series of lectures on poetry in London at the Royal Institution; and he was urged by Sir Walter Scott to become a candidate for the chair of literature at Edin burgh university. In 5814 he went to Paris, making there the acquaintance of the elder Schlegel, of Baron Cuvier and others. His pecuniary anxieties were relieved in 1815 by a legacy of 14,000. He continued to occupy himself with his Specimens of the British Poets, published in 1819, an admirable selection with short lives of the poets ; prefixed to it is an essay on poetry con taining much valuable criticism. In 1820 he accepted the editor ship of the New Monthly Magazine, and in the same year made another tour in Germany. Four years later appeared his "Theo doric," a not very successful poem of domestic life. He took an active share in the foundation of the University of London, visiting Berlin to inquire into the German system of education, and making recommendations which were adopted by Lord Brougham. He was elected lord rector of Glasgow university three times (1826-29). In the last election he had Sir Walter Scott for a rival. In 1834 he travelled to Paris and Algiers, where he wrote his Letters from the South (printed 1837).
The small production of Campbell may be partly explained by his domestic calamities. His wife died in 1828. Of his two sons, one died in infancy and the other became insane. His own health suffered, and he gradually withdrew from public life. He died at Boulogne on June 15 Campbell's other works include a Life of Mrs. Siddons (1842) and a narrative poem, "The Pilgrim of Glencoe" (1842).
See The Life and Letters of Thomas Campbell (5849), edited by William Beattie, M.D. ; Literary Reminiscences and Memoirs of Thomas Campbell (186o) by Cyrus Redding; The Poetical Works of Thomas Campbell (1875), in the Aldine edition of the British poets, edited by the Rev. W. Alfred Hill, with a sketch of the poet's life by William Allingham; and the "Oxford Edition" of the Complete Works of Thomas Campbell (1908), edited by J. Logie Robertson. See also Thomas Campbell in the Famous Scots Series, by J. C. Hadden, and a selection by Lewis Campbell (19o4) for the Golden Treasury Series.