David Douglas

From the Douglas Family Bible, written by David: "David Douglas & Sarah Burns Millidge were married at 25 Gayfield Square Edinburgh on Thursday July 5th 1855 by Revd. Dr. Clark. St Andrew’s Church -."

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The Times, 6 April 1916:

Mr. David Douglas

A Notable Edinburgh Publisher

The death is announced at Edinburgh on Tuesday last of Mr. David Douglas, publisher, in his 93rd year.

Mr. Douglas was born at Stranraer in 1823 and received his business training in the house of Messrs. William Blackwood and Sons, which in the thirties and forties of the last century was engaged in the selling, as well as the publishing, of books. He set up for himself in 1847.

Mr. Douglas never launched out into publishing on a big scale. His ventures were comparatively few, but were singularly well chosen. Among his earliest authors were Dr. John Brown, for whom he published the "Horae Subsecivae," including such well-known pieces as "Rab and His Friends" and "Pet Marjorie." He also published several well-known volumes of sermons, when sermons were more read than they are now, and a number of learned works, all of which were of sterling value in their day. In 1882 he brought out a neat series of reprints of American novels, which had a great vogue, and which introduced to the British public practically for the first times writers no less eminent than Mr. W. D. Howells and the late Mr. Henry James. His most famous publications, however, were probably the full text of Sir Walter Scott's Journal and a collection of his Letters, both of which he edited and annotated himself, with admirable judgment.

If Mr. Douglas had been asked to what episode in his long and busy life he looked back with most pride, it would probably have been to his editorship of the North British Review, which lasted from 1863 to 1869.