Alexander Selkirk was a Scottish adventurer. He was born in 1676 at Largo, Fifeshire and died in 1721. He joined Dampier's privateering expedition in 1703; but when the vessel he was aboard landed at Juan Fernandez, off the west coast of South America, in 1704, he asked to be put ashore because of an argument with the ship's captain. In 1709 he left the island with Dampier, returned to Largo where he led a reclusive life, before returning to the sea. His experiences were the inspiration for the character Robinson Crusoe in the book by Daniel Defoe. Research Alexander Selkirk
Daniel Defoe was an English novelist and political writer. He was born in 1660 or 1661 in London and died in 1731. His father, James Foe, carried on the trade of a butcher. In 1686 He joined the insurrection of the Duke of Monmouth, and had the good fortune to escape; after which he made several unsuccessful attempts at business, and at last turned bis attention to literature.
In 1701 appeared his satire in verse, The True-born Englishman, in favour of William III. As a zealousWhig and Dissenter he was frequently in trouble. For publishing The Shortest Way with the Dissenters in 1702, the drift of which was misunderstood by both Churchmen and Dissenters, he was pilloried and imprisoned in Newgate, obtaining bis liberty through the influence of Harley, who employed him in several important missions, particularly in the negotiations for the union with Scotland, of which he wrote the history. While in Newgate, in 1704, he commenced the Review, a literary and political periodical which lasted for nine years. In 1705 he wrote a short account of the Apparition of Mrs Veal, a fictitious narrative accompanying a translation of Drelincourt on Death. In 1706 he published his largest poem, entitled Jure Divino, a satire on the doctrine of divine right.
In 1707 he was in Scotland, which he also visited several times subsequently in connection with political affairs, and as an agent of those in power. In 1719 appeared the most popular of all his performances: The Life and Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, the favourable reception of which was immediate and universal. The success of Daniel Defoe in this performance induced him to write a number of other lives and adventures in character; as Moll Flanders, Captain Singleton, Roxana, Duncan Campbell, The Memoirs of a Cavalier, Journal of the Plague, etc.
After the accession of George I he was employed by government in some underhand work connected with the obnoxious Jacobite press, and was a prolific contributor to periodical and ephemeral literature. Research Daniel Defoe
George Chalmers was a Scottish antiquary. He was born in 1742 and died in 1825. He studied law at Edinburgh, and removed to America, where he practised for upwards of ten years. On his return he was appointed in 1786 clerk to the Board of Trade, an office held by him until his death in 1825. He published various political and statistical works, but latterly turned his attention in a great measure from political science to literature. In 1790 he published his niography of Daniel Defoe, and in 1794 his biography of Thomas Ruddiman. In 1800 he edited the works of Allan Ramsay; and in 1806 the writings of Sir David Lindsay; but his chief work was his Caledonia, of which the first volume was published in 1807, a laborious historical and topographical account of North Britain from the most ancient to recent times. Three volumes were published during George Chalmers' lifetime, but he left the remainder of the work nearly ready for the press, and it was published around 1900. Research George Chalmers
The Juan Fernandez Islands are a group of three almost uninhabited islands in the Pacific Ocean 640 km west of Chile. A pirate, Alexander Selkirk famously lived alone on one of the islands for four years and gave rise to the rumour that his experiences were the basis for Daniel Defoe's story 'Robinson Crusoe'. Research Juan Fernandez Islands
Newgate was a former jail in the city of London. It was built during the reign of Henry I, and in 1241 rebuilt with the sum of 20,000 marks extracted from the wealthy Jews of London. The original building was destroyed in the great fire in 1666, but the prison was rebuilt in 1770. The interior was also ruined by fire in the Lord Gordon riots in 1780, when 300 prisoners were let loose on the populace - a scene described by Charles Dickens in Barnaby Rudge. Many noted prisoners were confined within the walls of Newgate - among them George Wither, Daniel Defoe, Jack Sheppard, Titus Oates and William Penn. After 1877 Newgate ceased to be used as a place of incarceration and after 1868 executions took place inside its walls until it was finally demolished in 1904 to make room for the Middlesex sessions-house. Research Newgate
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Alexander Selkirk
