Chambers, WILLIAM, publisher, was born 16th April 1800 at Peebles, his father being a cotton manufacturer there. The boy got a fair elementary education; but owing to the father's misfortunes, his schooling terminated with his thirteenth year. Hence his education for life-work was mainly due to the habit, very early acquired and long maintained, of miscellaneous and extensive reading. The household migrated to Edinburgh in 1813, and next year William was apprenticed to a bookseller. His five years up, he started business in a humble way for himself (May 1819), to bookselling afterwards adding printing. Between 1825 and 1830 he wrote the Book of Scotland, and in conjunction with his brother Robert, a Gazetteer of Scotland. His experience gained as a bookseller and printer was next utilised in his attempt 'to take advantage of the universal appetite for instruction which at present exists,' and to 'supply that appetite with food of the best kind,' which resulted in the founding of Chambers's Edinburgh Journal on 4th February 1832. This was about six weeks in advance of the Penny Magazine, and it may be considered the pioneer of that class of cheap and popular periodicals of a wholesome kind now so generally diffused. At the end of the fourteenth number he united with his brother Robert in founding the business of William & Robert Chambers, in which they were associated in writing, editing, printing, and publishing. W. & R. Chambers issued a series of works designed for popular instruction, including besides the Journal, Information for the People, 2 vols.; the 'Educational Course' series; Cyclopædia of English Literature, 2 vols.; Miscellany of Useful and Entertaining Tracts, 20 vols.; Papers for the People, 12 vols.; and the present Encyclopædia, 10 vols. (1859–1868; new edition, 1888–92). In 1849 William acquired the estate of Glenormistoun, Peeblesshire, and in 1859 founded and endowed an institution in his native town for purposes of social improvement. Twice elected Lord Provost of Edinburgh, William occupied that office for four years (1865–69), during which he promoted several important public acts, including one for the improvement of the older part of the city, which has resulted in a great diminution of the death-rate. (The death-rate of the city in 1865–75 was 26·26 per 1000; in 1875–85, only 19·94.) He also carried out at his own cost a thorough restoration of St Giles' Cathedral. He died 20th May 1883, having shortly before received the offer of a baronetcy. He was made LL.D. of Edinburgh in 1872. A statue has been erected to his memory in Edinburgh. Besides many contributions to the Journal, he was author and editor of various volumes, and wrote The Youths' Companion and Counsellor, History of Peeblesshire (1864), Alice Gilroy, Stories of Remarkable Persons, Stories of Old Families, and Historical Sketch of St Giles' Cathedral (1879).
ROBERT CHAMBERS, born in Peebles, 10th July 1802, took to Latin and books at an early age, and began business as a bookseller in Edinburgh in 1818. His leisure hours were devoted to literary composition, the impulse to which, his brother says, came upon him like an inspiration at nineteen years of age. In 1824 he published the Traditions of Edinburgh, the writing of which procured him the friendship of Sir Walter Scott, who furnished some memoranda for the work. Between 1822 and 1834 he wrote in all twenty-five volumes, many of them of great literary interest and permanent historical value. He had already won reputation as an author when he joined his brother after the success of the Journal in 1832; and this success was materially promoted by his essays, and by his versatility and elegance as a writer, his diligence in collecting and working up stray material, and his perception of what was suited to the popular taste in history, poetry, science and arts. In 1844 he published anonymously the remarkable work, Vestiges of Creation, which prepared the way for Darwin's great work, The Origin of Species. The authorship, positively ascribed to him in the Athenæum of 2d December 1854, was first acknowledged in Mr Ireland's introduction to the 12th ed. (1884). He received the degree of LL.D. from St Andrews in 1863. The labour in preparing the Book of Days (2 vols. 1863) broke his health, and he died at St Andrews, 17th March 1871. Other works by Robert are Popular Rhymes of Scotland, a valuable contribution to folklore (1847), History of the Rebellions in Scotland, Life of James I., Scottish Ballads and Songs (3 vols. 1829), Dictionary of Eminent Scotsmen, Ancient Sea Margins (1838), The Life and Works of Robert Burns (4 vols. 1851), Domestic Annals of Scotland (3 vols. 1859-61), and Songs of Scotland prior to Burns (1862). His Select Writings (7 vols.) were published in 1847.—His son ROBERT CHAMBERS, born in 1832, became head of the firm in 1883, and conducted the Journal till his death, March 23, 1888.—See W. Chambers's Memoir of William and Robert Chambers (1872; 13th ed., with supplementary chapter, 1884).