KINGSLEY, CHARLES (1819-1875). —Novelist and historian, s. of a clergyman, was b. at Holne Vicarage near Dartmoor, but passed most of his childhood at Barnack in the Fen country, and Clovelly in Devonshire, ed. at King's Coll., London, and Camb. Intended for the law, he entered the Church, and became, in 1842, curate, and two years later rector, of Eversley, Hampshire. In the latter year he pub. The Saints' Tragedy, a drama, of which the heroine is St. Elizabeth of Hungary. Two novels followed, Yeast (1848) and Alton Locke (1850), in which he deals with social questions as affecting the agricultural labouring class, and the town worker respectively. He had become deeply interested in such questions, and threw himself heart and soul, in conjunction with F.D. Maurice and others, into the schemes of social amelioration, which they supported under the name of Christian socialism, contributing many tracts and articles under the signature of "Parson Lot." In 1853 appeared Hypatia, in which the conflict of the early Christians with the Greek philosophy of Alexandria is depicted; it was followed in 1855 by Westward Ho, perhaps his most popular work; in 1857 by Two Years Ago, and in 1866 by Hereward the Wake. At Last (1870), gave his impressions of a visit to the West Indies. His taste for natural history found expression in Glaucus, or the Wonders of the Shore (1855), and other works. The Water Babies is a story for children written to inspire love and reverence of Nature. K. was in 1860 appointed to the Professorship of Modern History at Camb., which he held until 1869. The literary fruit of this was Roman and Teuton (1864). In the same year he was involved in a controversy with J.H. Newman, which resulted in the publication by the latter of his Apologia. K., who had in 1869 been made a Canon of Chester, became Canon of Westminster in 1873. Always of a highly nervous temperament, his over-exertion resulted in repeated failures of health, and he d. in 1875. Though hot-tempered and combative, he was a man of singularly noble character. His type of religion, cheerful and robust, was described as "muscular Christianity." Strenuous, eager, and keen in feeling, he was not either a profoundly learned, or perhaps very impartial, historian, but all his writings are marked by a bracing and manly atmosphere, intense sympathy, and great descriptive power.
KINGSLEY, HENRY (1830-1876). —Novelist, brother of the above, ed. at King's Coll., London, and Oxf., which he left without graduating, and betook himself to the Australian gold-diggings, being afterwards in the mounted police. On his return in 1858 he devoted himself industriously to literature, and wrote a number of novels of much more than average merit, including Geoffrey Hamlyn (1859), The Hillyars and the Burtons (1865), Ravenshoe (1861), and Austin Elliot (1863). Of these Ravenshoe is generally regarded as the best. In 1869 he went to Edinburgh to ed. the Daily Review, but he soon gave this up, and became war correspondent for his paper during the Franco-German War.
KINGSLEY, MARY HENRIETTA (1862-1900). —Traveller, dau. of George Henry K. (himself a traveller, and author of South Sea Bubbles, a very successful book), and niece of [Charles K.] (q.v.). She travelled in West Africa, where she made valuable observations and collections. Her Travels in West Africa is one of the most original and stimulating books of its class. Miss K. had a singular power of viewing the religious rites of savage peoples from their point of view. She was about to undertake another journey, but stopped to nurse Boer prisoners, and d. of fever.
KINGSTON, WILLIAM HENRY GILES (1814-1880). —Writer of tales for boys, b. in London, but spent much of his youth in Oporto, where his f. was a merchant. His first book, The Circassian Chief, appeared in 1844. His first book for boys, Peter the Whaler, was pub. in 1851, and had such success that he retired from business and devoted himself entirely to the production of this kind of literature, in which his popularity was deservedly great; and during 30 years he wrote upwards of 130 tales, including The Three Midshipmen (1862), The Three Lieutenants (1874), The Three Commanders (1875), The Three Admirals (1877), Digby Heathcote, etc. He also conducted various papers, including The Colonist, and Colonial Magazine and East India Review. He was also interested in emigration, volunteering, and various philanthropic schemes. For services in negotiating a commercial treaty with Portugal he received a Portuguese knighthood, and for his literary labours a Government pension.
KIRKLAND, JOSEPH (1830-1894). —Novelist, b. in New York State, was a lawyer in Chicago, then served in the war. He is remembered as the author of two very vivid and life-like novels of pioneer life in the Far West, Illinois Zury and The McVeys. Other works are The Captain of Company K. and The Story of Chicago.