PORTER, JANE British novelist, daughter of an army surgeon, was born at Durham in 1776. Her life and reputation are closely linked with those of her sister, ANNA MARIA PORTER (1780-1832) , novelist, and her brother, SIR ROBERT KER PORTER (1775-1842), painter and traveller. After their father's death, in 1779, the mother removed from Durham, their birth place, to Edinburgh, where the children's love of romance was stimulated by their association with Flora Macdonald and the young Walter Scott. Mrs. Porter moved to London, so that her son might study art, and the sisters subsequently resided at Thames Ditton and at Esher with their mother until her death in 1831. Anna Maria Porter published Artless Tales in the first of a long series of works of which the more noteworthy are The Lake of Killarney (1804), The Hungarian Brothers (1807), Don Sebastian (1809) and Barony (183o).
Jane Porter—whose intellectual power, though slower in devel opment and in expression, was greater than her sister's—had in the meantime gained immediate popularity by her first work, Thad deus of Warsaw (1803), which was translated into several lan guages and procured her election as canoness of the Teutonic order of St. Joachim. In 181o, four years before the appearance of Waverley, she attempted national romance in her Scottish Chiefs. The picturesque power of narration displayed by Miss Porter has saved the story from the oblivion which has overtaken the works of most of Scott's predecessors in historical fiction. Her later works included The Pastor's Fireside (1815), Duke Christian of Luneburg (1824), Coming Out (1828) and The Field of Forty Footsteps (1828). In conjunction with her sister she published in
1826 the Tales round a Winter Hearth. She also wrote some plays, and frequent contributions to current periodical literature. On Sept. 21, 1832, Anna Maria died, and for the next ten years Jane became "a wanderer" amongst her relations and friends. She died at Bristol on May 24, 185o.
Robert Ker Porter painted altar-pieces and battle-scenes of im posing magnitude. He went to Russia as historical painter to the emperor in 1804, travelled in Finland and Sweden, where he re ceived knighthood from Gustavus IV. in 1806, and accompanied Sir John Moore to Spain in 1808. In 1811 he returned to Russia and married a Russian princess. He was knighted by the Prince Regent in 1813. In 1817 he travelled to Persia by way of St. Petersburg (Leningrad) and the Caucasus, returning through Bag dad and western Asia Minor. He examined the ruins of Persepolis, making many valuable drawings and copying cuneiform inscrip tions. In 1826 he became British consul in Venezuela. He died at St. Petersburg on May 4, 1842.
His works include: Travelling Sketches in Russia and Sweden (1808), Letters from Portugal and Spain (1809), Narrative of the late Campaign in Russia (1813), and Travels in Georgia, Persia, Armenia, Ancient Babylonia, etc., during the years 1817-182o (1821 22). After leaving Venezuela (1841) he again visited St. Petersburg, and died there suddenly on May 4, 1842. Jane Porter, who had joined him in Russia, then returned to England and took up her residence with her eldest brother at Bristol, where she died on May 24, 185o.