Life

Forsyth was son of Morris Forsyth and Jane Brands, and was born at Turriff, Aberdeenshire, 24 October 1818. He was educated at Fordyce Academy and the universities of Aberdeen and Edinburgh. For some years he studied medicine, becoming assistant to a country doctor, and twice acting as surgeon to a Greenland

Greenland

Greenland is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark, located between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Though physiographically a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe for...

 whaler, but he never took a medical degree, and ultimately abandoned medicine for literature. His first engagement was as sub-editor of the Inverness Courier (1842) under Robert Carruthers

Robert Carruthers

Robert Carruthers , journalist and miscellaneous writer, born in Dumfriesshire, was for a time a teacher in Huntingdon, and wrote a History of Huntingdon . In 1828 he became editor of the Inverness Courier, which he conducted with great ability...

, whom he assisted in the preparation of Chambers's Cyclopædia of English Literature. In 1843 he became sub-editor of the Aberdeen Herald, then conducted by Mr. Adam, and he contributed in prose and verse for several years. In 1848 he joined the staff of the Aberdeen Journal, and eventually was appointed editor, a post which he held for about thirty years.

In Aberdeen, at Bonnymuir, Maryville, Friendville, Gordondale, and Richmondhill, his successive homes, he spent more than thirty years. During the last ten years of his life Forsyth suffered from cancer of the mouth. After a long illness, he died on 21 June 1879. He was buried in the cemetery of Allenvale on the Dee. Forsyth married in 1854 Miss Eliza Fyfe, who survived him.

Activism

In Aberdeen, the establishment of the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor was mainly due to him, and he not only sat on the managing committee, but was for six years secretary. He read a paper to the Social Science Congress in 1877, on ‘The Province and Work of Voluntary Charitable Agencies in the Management of the Poor.’ Forsyth was elected a member of the first Aberdeen school board, and served as convener of a committee for questions affecting the grammar school and town council. Forsyth twas chosen captain of the citizens' battery. This appointment he held for eighteen years, retiring with the rank of major. Some of his martial songs obtained a wide popularity. He also took much interest in everything connected with the service, and made suggestions to the war office as to practical gunnery and the use of armed railway carriages in warfare.

Works

Forsyth's principal literary works were ‘The Martyrdom of Kelavane’ (1861) and ‘Idylls and Lyrics’ (1872). The latter volume contains ‘The Old Kirk Bell,’ and several other pieces published for the first time, but it was mainly made up of reprints from magazines. The most finished of these is ‘The River,’ which came out in the Cornhill Magazine

Cornhill Magazine

The Cornhill Magazine was a Victorian magazine and literary journal named after Cornhill Street in London.Cornhill was founded by George Murray Smith in 1860 and was published until 1975. It was a literary journal with a selection of articles on diverse subjects and serialisations of new novels...

in William Makepeace Thackeray

William Makepeace Thackeray

William Makepeace Thackeray was an English novelist of the 19th century. He was famous for his satirical works, particularly Vanity Fair, a panoramic portrait of English society.-Biography:...

's time. ‘The Piobrach o' Kinreen,’ an old piper's lament for the clearance of Glentannar, first appeared in Punch

Forsyth was in politics a liberal-conservative. During the American Civil War

American Civil War

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

 he was almost alone among Scottish journalists in advocating the cause of the Union. In the controversy of Charles Kingsley

Charles Kingsley

Charles Kingsley was an English priest of the Church of England, university professor, historian and novelist, particularly associated with the West Country and northeast Hampshire.-Life and character:...

 v. John Henry Newman he wrote with in support of the former, and received a letter of thanks from Kingsley. In church matters Charles Wordsworth

Charles Wordsworth

The Reverend Charles Wordsworth, M.A. was bishop of Bishop of St Andrews, Dunkeld and Dunblane in Scotland. He was a classical scholar, and taught at a public schools in England and Scotland...

, Bishop of St. Andrews and Alexander Ewing

Alexander Ewing

Alexander Ewing was a Scottish church leader.He was born of an old Highland family in Aberdeen, Scotland. In October 1838 he was admitted to deacon's orders, and after his return from Italy he took charge of the episcopal congregation at Forres, and was ordained a presbyter in the autumn of 1841...

, bishop of Argyle, corresponded with him privately. Forsyth also wrote two pamphlets on Scottish church questions, entitled ‘A Letter on Lay Patronage in the Church of Scotland’ (1867) and ‘The Day of Open Questions’ (1868). In the first of these he indicated the lines on which reform of the church might be carried out, ahead of the Act for the Abolition of Church Patronage (1874).

After his death ‘Selections’ from his unpublished writings, with a ‘Memoir,’ were edited by his friend Alexander Walker, Aberdeen. This volume reproduces ‘The Midnicht Meetin',’ a satire on the promoters of the union of the Aberdeen and Marischal colleges, originally printed for private circulation.