On 26th July, 1847, Sir John Easthope, who had been carrying on the paper at a loss for some time, sold it to the Duke of Newcastle, W. E. Gladstone, Sidney Herbert, and other influential Peelites. Its new Editor was John Douglas Cook, who had for some time been one of the reporters of The Times, and who gathered round him a brilliant staff of contributors, including George Sydney Smythe, afterwards Lord Strangford, Gilbert Venables, Abraham Hayward, William Vernon Harcourt, and Thackeray. Its business manager was William Delane, the father of the clever young editor of The Times, John Thaddeus Delane.
The Chronicle lingered on as a would-be Peelite organ till the autumn of 1854, when by a curious arrangement, the paper, with all its plant, was sold to Serjeant Glover, for £7500, on the understanding that, if he continued to support in it the Peelite policy, he should have the money back with interest, being paid £3000 a year for three years. That contract soon fell through, as Glover preferred to draw a subsidy from Louis Napoleon, and to make other experiments. At the close of 1854, the circulation of The Morning Chronicle averaged only about 2500, while that of The Morning Post was about 3000, that of The Morning Herald about 3500, that of The Daily News about 5300, that of The Morning Advertiser about 6600, and that of The Times about 55,000.
The last number of The Morning Chronicle appeared March 19, 1862, when what at one time had been the most influential journal in the country altogether ceased to exist.
Of this paper Sheridan speaks in The Critic, and to it Byron addressed a Familiar Epistle. For its columns W. Hazlitt wrote some of the finest criticisms in our own or any other language. Some of the early Sketches by Boz appeared in it, but they were really commenced in the old Monthly Magazine. Dickens’s father was one of the staff. Hazlitt also contributed to it Parliamentary Reports, as at a later period did C. Dickens.
Among other distinguished writers in The Morning Chronicle were Lord Brougham, the Duke of Sussex, David Ricardo, Cyrus Redding, Albany Fonblanque, James and John Stuart Mill, John Payne Collier, Eyre Evans Crowe, Charles Buller, Lord Holland, Joseph Parkes, Michael Joseph Quin, George Hogarth, James Fraser, W. Hazlitt, secundus, Lord Melbourne, W. Johnson Fox, Henry Mayhew, Lord Palmerston, A. B. Reach, Alex. and Charles Mackay, Tom Taylor.
THE MORNING POST.
The Morning Post, the next daily paper in order of date to The Chronicle, first appeared in 1772, and was probably projected by John Bell. Three years subsequently the Rev. Henry Bate (who took in 1784 the name of Dudley, and was created a baronet in 1816) joined it, and was connected with it till the end of 1780, when he quarrelled with his colleagues, and set up The Morning Herald, the first number of which appeared on Nov. 1 in the same year. In June, 1781, he was sentenced to a year’s imprisonment for an atrocious libel on the Duke of Richmond. He was (says Horace Walpole, in his Journal of the Reign of George III.), the worst of all the scandalous libellers that had appeared, both on private persons as well as public. His life was dissolute, and he had fought more than one duel. Yet Lord Sandwich had procured for him a good Crown living, and he was believed to be pensioned by the Court. He died in 1824.
After Bate, as editor, came the Rev. W. Jackman (or Jackson)—an equally discreditable clergyman,—and he was succeeded by John Taylor (author of Monsieur Tonson), for whom Peter Pindar (Dr. John Wolcot) wrote whimsical verses.
In 1792, Mr. Tattersall was the responsible proprietor, who, knowing more about horses and sport than about the elegancies of literature, Dr. Wolcot continued to be the chief writer; and who, besides his clever verses, gave much information upon affairs of the prize-ring and kindred amusements. In 1795, Tattersall sold the entire copyright, with house and printing materials, for £600. The circulation then was only 350 daily.
The purchaser was Mr. Daniel Stuart; and Mr. Christie, the auctioneer, was also a proprietor. Previous to this time, Robert Burns was applied to, to supply poetry, but none was ever sent. Daniel Stuart was not twenty-nine when he bought The Morning Post; and James (afterwards Sir Jas.) Mackintosh, who was his brother-in-law, and was a regular contributor, was his senior only by a year.