FIELDS, JAMES THOMAS ( 1817-81). An American author and publisher. He was born in Portsmouth, N. H., and was educated in the pub lic schools of that place. In 1834 he removed to Boston, and in 1839 he became junior partner in the publishing firm of Tieknor, Reed & Fields, in which he later became the controlling partner. His charming personal qualities, his sympathy, his liberality to all with whom he dealt, and his unquestionable literary judgment drew to him most of the best-known American authors of the time, and he became the publisher of Longfellow, Hawthorne, Emerson, Holmes, Whittier. and Lowell. besides introducing Tennyson and Brown ing to American readers even before their true worth was recognized in England. He edited the _Atlantic Monthly from 1862 to 1870. The last ten years of his life were spent in authorship and lecturing. His own published works include:
Poems (1849-54) ; a Few l'erses for a Few Friends (1858) : Yesterdays with Authors (1872) ; Hawthorne (1876) In and Out of Doors with Charles Dickens (1876): and Underbrush, a volume of essays. He also edited, with Edwin P. Whipple, a Family Library of British Poetry (1877). Consult : Annie Adams Fields (his wife), Memoir of James 'P. Fields. by his Wife (1841); also her Authors and Friends (189(0.— ANNIE AnAms (1834—), his wife, was born in Boston, Mass. Tier publications include: .1 Shelf of Old Books; Fmler the Olire (UM), a pollee tion of verse: how to Help the Poor (1883) ; Thr Singing Shepherd, and Other Poems (1895) ; t uthors and Friends (1S96); the Life and Let firs of Harriet Beecher Moire (1897) ; and Or pheus. a .11asqup (1900).