Mark Boyd (1805 – 12 September 1879, in London) was an English author. Mark Boyd was born in

Surrey Surrey () is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Greater London to the northeast, Kent to the east, East Sussex, East and West Sussex to the south, and Hampshire and Berkshire to the wes ...

near the

Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after th ...

, the younger son of Edward Boyd of Merton Hall,

Newton Stewart Newton Stewart (Scottish Gaelic language, Gd: ''Baile Ùr nan Stiùbhartach'') is a former burgh town in the historical county of Wigtownshire in Dumfries and Galloway, southwest Scotland. The town is on the River Cree with most of the town to ...

Wigtownshire Wigtownshire or the County of Wigtown (, ) is one of the Counties of Scotland, historic counties of Scotland, covering an area in the south-west of the country. Until 1975, Wigtownshire was an counties of Scotland, administrative county used for ...

, a merchant. His brother was

Benjamin Boyd Benjamin Boyd (21 August 180115 October 1851) was a Scotland, Scottish entrepreneur who became a major shipowner, banker, Squatting (Australia), grazier, politician and Blackbirding, blackbirder in the British colony of New South Wales. He wa ...

. He mainly spent his childhood on the Scottish estate, which was near the

River Cree The River Cree is a river in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland which runs through Newton Stewart and into the Solway Firth. It forms part of the boundary between the counties of Wigtownshire and Kirkcudbrightshire. The tributaries of the Cree are ...

. He later pursued an active business career in London, becoming London director of a Scottish insurance society, and a lively promoter of the colonisation of Australia and New Zealand, and of other useful public undertakings. He travelled much in Europe. He published an account in the ''London and Shetland Journal'' of a journey in the

Orkney Isles Orkney (), also known as the Orkney Islands, is an archipelago off the north coast of mainland Scotland. The plural name the Orkneys is also sometimes used, but locals now consider it outdated. Part of the Northern Isles along with Shetland, ...

in 1839. On 23 December 1848 he married Emma Anne, the widow of 'Romeo' Coates, who had been run over and killed in the previous February. He died at the Alexandra Hotel, Hyde Park on 12 September 1879, aged 74.Jennett Humphreys, rev. Dean Wilson
‘Boyd, Mark (1804/5–1879)’
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Oxford Dictionary of National Biography The ''Dictionary of National Biography'' (''DNB'') is a standard work of reference on notable figures from History of the British Isles, British history, published since 1885. The updated ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' (''ODNB'') ...

'', Oxford University Press, 2004, accessed 1 February 2011

Works

In 1864 Boyd published a pamphlet about Australia, where his disgraced fraudulent slaver brother had settled. His ''Reminiscences of Fifty Years'' (1871) was dedicated to the Australian colonists, and ''Social Gleanings'' (1875, written from Oatlands, Walton-on-Thames) was dedicated to Dean Ramsay.

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Boyd, Mark 1805 births 1879 deaths English male writers Writers from Surrey