Samuel Smiles

It has been called "the bible of mid-Victorian liberalism" and had lasting effects on British political thought.

• Name — Samuel Smiles • Born — 23 December 1812 • Birthplace — Haddington, East Lothian, Scotland • Died — 16 April 1904 (age 91) • Place of death — Kensington, London, England • Known for — Biographies and self-help books • Education — University of Edinburgh • Notable Works — Self-Help

Born in Haddington, East Lothian, Scotland, Smiles was the son of Janet Wilson of Dalkeith and Samuel Smiles of Haddington. He was one of eleven surviving children. While his family members were strict Reformed Presbyterians, he did not practice. He studied at a local school, leaving at the age of 14. He apprenticed to be a doctor under Dr. Robert Lewins. This arrangement enabled Smiles to study medicine at the University of Edinburgh in 1829. There he furthered his interest in politics, and became a strong supporter of Joseph Hume. His father died in the 1832 cholera epidemic, but Smiles was enabled to continue with his studies because he was supported by his mother. She ran the small family general store firm in the belief that the "Lord will provide". Her example of working ceaselessly to support herself and his nine younger siblings strongly influenced Smiles's future life, but he developed a benign and tolerant outlook that was sometimes at odds with that of his Reformed Presbyterian forebears. In 1838 Smiles was offered the editorship of the reformist paper, the Leeds Times. He spent the next twenty years in the city, moving to live on Woodhouse Cliff in 1847.

In 1837, he wrote articles for the Edinburgh Weekly Chronicle and the Leeds Times, campaigning for parliamentary reform. In November 1838, Smiles was invited to become the editor of the Leeds Times, a position he accepted and filled until 1842. In May 1840, Smiles became secretary to the Leeds Parliamentary Reform Association, an organisation that held to the six objectives of Chartism: universal suffrage for all men over the age of 21; equal-sized electoral districts; voting by secret ballot; an end to the need of MPs to qualify for Parliament, other than by winning an election; pay for MPs; and annual Parliaments. As editor of the Leeds Times, he advocated radical causes ranging from women's suffrage to free trade and parliamentary reform. By the late 1840s, however, Smiles became concerned about the advocation of physical force by Chartists Feargus O'Connor and George Julian Harney, although he seems to have agreed with them that the movement's current tactics were not effective, saying that "mere political reform will not cure the manifold evils which now afflict society". On 7 December 1843, Samuel married Sarah Ann Holmes Dixon in Leeds. They had three daughters and two sons. In 1845, he left the Leeds Times and became a secretary for the newly formed Leeds & Thirsk Railway. After nine years, he worked for the South Eastern Railway. In the 1850s, Smiles abandoned his interest in parliament and decided that self-help was the most important place of reform. In 1859, he published his book Self-Help; with Illustrations of Character and Conduct. Smiles wrote articles for the Quarterly. In an article on railways, he argued that the railways should be nationalised and that third-class passengers should be encouraged. In 1861 Smiles published an article from the Quarterly, renamed Workers Earnings, Savings, and Strikes. He claimed poverty in many instances was caused by habitual improvidence: In 1866, Smiles became president of the National Provident Institution but left in 1871, after suffering a debilitating stroke. The Globe Permanent Benefit Building Society 493 New Cross Road Deptford SE14 Founded 1868 Incorporated 1878. Founded for the mutual benefit of investors and borrowers with the approval of the late Samuel Smiles. The 50th Anniversary Jubilee Report (1 August 1918) states that he was a founding Director and was involved for 3 years. All founders lived in Deptford or the neighbourhood as did the ten successors.

Smiles was not very successful in his careers as a doctor and journalist. He joined several cooperative ventures, but they failed for lack of capital. Disillusioned, he turned away from middle-class utopianism. He finally found intellectual refuge and national fame in the isolation of self-help. The origins of his most famous book, Self-Help, lay in a speech he gave in March 1845 in response to a request by a Mutual Improvement Society, published as, The Education of the Working Classes. In it Smiles said: The newly founded Routledge publishing house rejected publishing Self-Help in 1855. Twenty years later Smiles was seated next to George Routledge at a dinner, and he said to him, "And when, Dr. Smiles, are we to have the honour of publishing one of your books?"; Smiles replied that Mr. Routledge already had the honour of rejecting Self-Help. Although John Murray was willing to publish Self-Help on a half-profits system, Smiles rejected this as he did not want the book to lose its anecdotes. In 1859, Smiles self-published the book, retaining the copyright, while he paid John Murray a ten per cent commission. It sold 20,000 copies within one year of its publication. By the time of Smiles's death in 1904 it had sold over a quarter of a million copies. Self-Help "elevated [Smiles] to celebrity status: almost overnight, he became a leading pundit and much-consulted guru". Smiles "suddenly became the fashion and he was deluged with requests that he should lay foundation stones, sit for his portrait, present prizes to orphan children, make speeches from platforms. The simple fellow was pleased with these invitations, but naturally he could not accept. He had his work to do... his duty did not lie on any public platform... It lay in his office with his Work".

Smiles intended to publish a book titled Conduct, in 1896. He submitted it to his publisher, but John Murray declined to publish the book. In 1898, publication was denied again. After the death of Smiles in 1904, the manuscript of Conduct was found in his desk and, on the advice of John Murray, was destroyed. No copy is known to exist.

Sir George Reid was commissioned to paint Smiles's portrait, completed in 1877 and now in the collection of the National Gallery, London. Copies of his handwriting can be found in the archives of East Lothian Council. When, in 1892, William Gladstone returned to power and, as prime minister, introduced his Second Irish Home Rule Bill, Smiles wrote to his son in Ulster: "Don't you rebel. Keep quiet, though I see your name among the agitators... Your letter is frightfully alarming... Gladstone has come into power and we are threatened with Civil War. This cannot be the result of good statesmanship. Yet there are Liberal members to cheer on the maniac. Alas, alas for Liberalism!... Must I give you six months notice to withdraw my loans to the B.R. Co., for I want to keep the little money I have for wife and bairns, not for arming the Ulstermen". Smiles wrote to Lucy Smiles in 1893, "This Home Rule Bill is horrid... I am quite appalled at that wretched hound, miscalled statesman, throwing the country into a state of turmoil. I cannot understand how so many persons in this part of Britain follow that maniac, just like a flock of sheep. He is simply bursting with self-conceit. Alas! Alas for Liberalism!" On 16 April 1904, Samuel Smiles died in Kensington in his 92nd year, London and was buried in Brompton Cemetery. Shortly before his death, he was reportedly offered a knighthood, which he declined to accept. Smiles's grandchildren include Sir Walter Smiles, an Ulster Unionist Party MP. Through that branch of the family, Smiles is also the great-great-grandfather of Bear Grylls, a well-known adventurer.

• Self-Help, 1859 • Character, 1871 • Thrift, 1875 • Duty, 1880 • Life and Labour, 1887

• The Life of George Stephenson, 1857 • The Story of The Life of George Stephenson, London, 1859 (abridgement of the above) • Brief biographies, Boston, 1860 (articles reprinted from periodicals such as the Quarterly Review) • Lives of the Engineers, 5 vol, London 1862 • Vol 1, Early engineers – James Brindley, Sir Cornelius Vermuyden, Sir Hugh Myddleton, Capt John Perry • Vol 2, Harbours, Lighthouses and Bridges – John Smeaton and John Rennie (1761–1821) • Vol 3, History of Roads – John Metcalf and Thomas Telford • Vol 4, The Steam Engine – Boulton and Watt • Vol 5, The Locomotive – George Stephenson and Robert Stephenson • Industrial Biography, 1863 • Includes lives of Andrew Yarranton, Benjamin Huntsman, Dud Dudley, Henry Maudslay, Joseph Clement, etc.. • Vol 4 Boulton and Watt, 1865 • The Huguenots: Their Settlements, Churches and Industries in England and Ireland, 1867 • The Huguenots in France. 1870 • Lives of the Engineers, new ed. in 5 vols, 1874 • (includes the lives of Stephenson and Boulton and Watt) • Life of a Scotch Naturalist: Thomas Edward, 1875 • George Moore, Merchant and Philanthropist, 1878 • Robert Dick, Baker of Thurso, Geologist and Botanist, 1878 • Men of Invention and Industry, 1884 • Phineas Pett, Francis Pettit Smith, John Harrison, John Lombe, William Murdoch, Frederick Koenig, The Walter family of The Times, William Clowes, Charles Bianconi, and chapters on Industry in Ireland, Shipbuilding in Belfast, Astronomers and students in humble life • James Nasmyth, engineer, an autobiography, ed. Samuel Smiles, 1885 • A Publisher and his Friends. Memoir and Correspondence of the Late John Murray, 1891 • Jasmin. Barber, poet, Philanthropist, 1891 • Josiah Wedgwood, his Personal History, 1894 • The Autobiography of Samuel Smiles, LLD, ed. T. Mackay, 1905 – New York edition The growth of industrial archaeology and history in Britain from the 1960s caused a number of these titles to be reprinted, and a number are available on the Web from such sources as Project Gutenberg, noted below.