James De Mille
James De Mille was a Canadian author who produced over twenty novels during the 1860s and 1870s. Born as the third of ten children in a merchant family in Saint John, New Brunswick, he pursued his education at Horton Collegiate Academy and Acadia College, eventually earning a Master's degree from Brown University in 1854. De Mille began his career in literature as an assistant editor for a Baptist periodical and later opened a bookstore. He transitioned into academia, teaching classics at Acadia College and later rhetoric and history at Dalhousie College in Halifax for many years.
De Mille married Elizabeth Anne Pryor in 1858, and they had five children. Despite his earlier successes with Harper Brothers Publishing, his later works faded from public memory. Posthumously, his most significant work, "A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder," was published in 1888 after being discovered among his manuscripts by his wife. Initially receiving mixed reviews, the manuscript later gained popularity, highlighting De Mille's lasting impact on Canadian literature and solidifying his status as a notable fiction writer of the 19th century.
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James De Mille
Author
- Born: August 23, 1833
- Birthplace: Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada
- Died: January 28, 1880
- Place of death: Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
Biography
James De Mille wrote over twenty popular novels in the short period between the early 1860’s and late 1870’s. His most important piece, A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder (1888), was not published until after his death but is the reason he is remembered as one of Canada’s most successful nineteenth century fiction writers.
De Mille was the third of ten children born to Nathan De Mill (originally spelled without the “e” at the end), a Saint John merchant, and Elizabeth De Mill. He attended Horton Collegiate Academy in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, at the age of fourteen. A year later, he transferred to Acadia College, but it was Brown University that awarded him a M.A. in 1854.
After graduation, De Mille returned to Saint John to be the assistant editor of The Christian Visitor, a weekly Baptist periodical. Four months later, he moved to Cincinnati and worked as a bookkeeper but was back in Saint John by 1856. In 1857, De Mille opened the Colonial Book Store with a businessman with whom he formed a partnership. He sold the store in 1861, the same year he wrote several stories for the Christian Watchman, a paper his brother edited. That summer, he started as a professor of classics at Acadia College, a respected position he held for four years until his resignation in 1865. After Acadia, De Mille taught as a professor of rhetoric and history at Dalhousie College in Halifax, Nova Scotia, for fifteen years.
De Mille married Elizabeth Anne Pryor in 1858 after a long engagement. They had five children; the first, William Budd De Mille, was born in 1859. Around this time, De Mille helped establish the Marsh Ridge Baptist Church, where his brother, Elisha De Mille, became a pastor. In the late 1870’s, Elisha De Mille was diagnosed with lung congestion, and his death left his family with a debt of twenty thousand dollars.
After some early successes, Harper Brothers Publishing Company decided to pay De Mille two thousand dollars for each novel published. However, his success did not last, and many of his books were soon forgotten. His wife discovered A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder among De Mille’s manuscripts seven years after his death and sent it to Harper Brothers, where it was published in 1888. Although the book received mixed reviews after its first publication, it gained more popularity over the years and created more interest than the day it was introduced to the literary world.