GEORGE

See also:

• SMITH
• SMITH, ADAM (1723–1790)
• SMITH, ALEXANDER (183o-1867)
• SMITH, ANDREW JACKSON (1815-1897)
• SMITH, CHARLES EMORY (1842–1908)
• SMITH, CHARLES FERGUSON (1807–1862)
• SMITH, CHARLOTTE (1749-1806)
• SMITH, COLVIN (1795—1875)
• SMITH, EDMUND KIRBY (1824-1893)
• SMITH, G
• GEORGE SMITH (1789-1846)
• SMITH, GEORGE (184o-1876)
• SMITH, GEORGE ADAM (1856- )
• SMITH, GERRIT (1797–1874)
• SMITH, GOLDWIN (1823-191o)
• SMITH, HENRY BOYNTON (1815-1877)
• SMITH, HENRY JOHN STEPHEN (1826-1883)
• SMITH, HENRY PRESERVED (1847– )
• SMITH, JAMES (1775–1839)
• SMITH, JOHN (1579-1631)
• SMITH, JOHN RAPHAEL (1752–1812)
• SMITH, JOSEPH, JR
• SMITH, MORGAN LEWIS (1822–1874)
• SMITH, RICHARD BAIRD (1818-1861)
• SMITH, ROBERT (1689-1768)
• SMITH, SIR HENRY GEORGE WAKELYN
• SMITH, SIR THOMAS (1513-1577)
• SMITH, SIR WILLIAM (1813-1893)
• SMITH, SIR WILLIAM SIDNEY (1764-1840)
• SMITH, SYDNEY (1771-1845)
• SMITH, THOMAS SOUTHWOOD (1788-1861)
• SMITH, WILLIAM (1769-1839)
• SMITH, WILLIAM (c. 1730-1819)
• SMITH, WILLIAM (fl. 1596)
• SMITH, WILLIAM FARRAR (1824—1903)
• SMITH, WILLIAM HENRY (1808—1872)
• SMITH, WILLIAM HENRY (1825—1891)
• SMITH, WILLIAM ROBERTSON (1846-'894)

SMITH (1789-1846)  , British publisher, founder of the firm of Smith, Elder & Co., was born in Scotland in 1789 . From Elgin, where he was apprenticed to a bookseller, he migrated to London, where he found employment first with Rivingtons, and afterwards with John Murray . In 18x6 Smith and another Scot, Alexander Elder, began business at 158 Fenchurch Street as booksellers and stationers; and in 1819 they became publishers also . It was here that GEORGE SMITH (2) (1824—1901), the most famous member of the firm, was born on the 19th of, March 1824; and in the same year the business was removed to 65 Cornhill . At the age of fourteen George Smith (2) came into the business, and in 1843 he took over the control of the publishing department . On his father's death in 1846 the responsibility of the business devolved principally upon him, and under his management it increased thirteen times in twenty years . A large portion of the business was connected with foreign agencies and banking, especially with India, but this was relinquished in 1868 to his partner Henry S . King, who now separated from the firm, retaining the old premises at Cornhill, while Smith removed the publishing business, now under his sole control, to 15 Waterloo Place . For over thirty years Smith was the friend and publisher of Ruskin, and it was with him that Jane Eyre found a publisher . In 18K5 was started the Overland Mail, a weekly periodical for Indian readers, and the Homeward Mail, containing Indian news for English readers . By Smith, Elder & Co. were issued works by Darwin, Ruskin, Thackeray, Robert and Mrs Browning, Wilkie Collins, Matthew Arnold, Miss Martineau, James Payn and Mrs Humphry Ward . In 1866 was published Trollope's Last Chronicles of Barset, for which £3000 was paid .

In

January 186o the first of George Smith's three great undertakings . was begun, the Cornhill Magazine being issued in that month under the editorship of Thackeray . The second venture was the founding in 1865 of the Pall Mall Gazette (see NEWSPAPERS) . The third and most important was the publication of the Dictionary of National Biography, the first volume of which was issued in 1882; it was completed in 1901, in 66 volumes; and this monumental work was the crowning effort of a successful career . Smith was a rich man, not only from his publishing business, but on account of his large ownership in. the mineral water Apollinaris and other ventures . His second son, Alexander Murray Smith, joined the firm in 189o, and with him was associated in 1894 his brother-in-law Reginald J . Smith, who in 1899 became acting partner . George Smith himself died at Byfleet, near Weybridge, on the 6th of April 19oI . See the memoir (1901) of George Smith (2) prefixed to vol . .i. of the supplement to the Dictionary of National Biography; reminiscences contributed to the Cornhill Magazine (Nov . 1900-Feb . 1901) by George Smith; an article by Sir Leslie Stephen in the same magazine (May 19o1); and the special number of the Cornhill in January 191o, published on its 50th anniversary .