Alexander Leighton

Editor of Tales of the Borders, was born at Dundee in 1800. After distinguishing himself at Dundee academy he studied medicine at Edinburgh and settled there, first working as a lawyer’s clerk and then as a man of letters.

The Tales of the Borders, a series of short stories, still popular among the Scottish peasantry, was projected at Berwick-on-Tweed in 1834 by John Mackay Wilson, on whose death in 1835 his brother continued the work for a time. Shortly afterwards an Edinburgh publisher named Sutherland became proprietor, and Leighton was appointed editor and chief story writer; the series was completed in 1840. He received assistance from Hugh Miller, Thomas Gillespie (1777–1844), and others. Reading widely he had an extensive, if not very accurate, knowledge of many subjects, including metaphysics and especially Hume’s philosophy. He died 24 Dec. 1874.

A biography by Thomas Wilson Bayne, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 33