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You must have heard about The London Magazine – you are after all holding it in your hands right now. The magazine’s current incarnation can be traced back to 1954, with John Lehmann as founding editor, but The London Magazine ‘brand’ goes back further, all the way to 1732. There have been six different publications with this title in total (1732-1785; 1820-1829; 1840; 1875-1879; 1898-1933; 1954-present). The events I will recount took place from January 1820 to February 1821, during the second iteration of this most recognisable of literary names.
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In January 1820, The London Magazine was relaunched after a hiatus of 35 years, with the arch-liberal John Scott as editor. This new version was very similar in format to the then popular Blackwood’s Magazine (1817-1980), a conservative publication edited and printed in Edinburgh. From the start, John Scott showed a great eye for scouting the key names of his time, providing a home to authors like William Wordsworth, Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats, and Thomas de Quincey (who later serialised his Confessions of an English Opium Eater in the magazine), among many others. These names might be impressive to us now but they didn’t really impress anyone in Blackwood’s, who in their January 1820 issue marked The London Magazine’s return with a patronising editorial relishing in the similarities between both publications:
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Notices to Correspondents.

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We have much to say to you, gentle Correspondents, but we must devise a new mode of address, now that our Brother-Editor of Baldwin’s London Magazine has adopted our ancient style. Indeed, his Miscellany so resembles our own in form and pressure, that common eyes may, at first sight, mistake it for its elder brother. It is, however, a promising young Publication; and should any part of the reading public be of opinion that it is, in any respect, an improvement upon ours, we must, in like manner, proceed forthwith to exhibit an improvement upon it, till the world will at last have assurance of a Magazine. Meanwhile, we have room for one Sonnet only…

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This in turn motivated the following editorial from John Scott in The London Magazine’s February issue of the same year:
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We have to thank our brethren Editors of Blackwood for a civil notice in their last Number—just received. This is far more agreeable (to both parties we presume) than a civil war. Not wishing that they should outdo us in courtesy, we make it a point to return their card, and beg to acquaint them, that we shall not willingly allow them to outdo us, in any thing else. If we have (as they say) imitated their manner, have they not, in return, taken some hints from us as to manners? May the interchange continue to be profitable to both!
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These editorials come across as chummy and friendly, far from ‘a civil war’. And yet, a year later one of the editors involved in this insignificant verbal scuffle would be dead.
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How the events unfolded leading to the tragic finale can be difficult to follow. Much of what happened between the feuding parties was determined by the code of honour observed by the gentry during this period, and what might seem meaningless to us now could have been an unbearable insult at the time. In any case, the bitting exchanges continued, with Blackwood’s Magazine often provoking John Scott, especially in their attacks on the Cockney School of Poetry, in which his friend John Keats was involved. But as noted above, the exchanges were rather jocular and friendly. And when they were more brutal – for example when Blackwood’s focused their attacks on the Cockney School – they weren’t necessarily ad hominem. So what went wrong?
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Leonidas Jones, in a very detailed 1971 article claims that Scott’s attitude towards Blackwood’s changed after he travelled to Edinburgh in May 1820. Here he might have become acquainted with some dirt concerning the conservative magazine, something that set him on a collision course with its editors. To the best of my knowledge, there is no documentation supporting this assertion but what we do know is that Scott did indeed change the tone of his editorials after this trip, resorting to a much more aggressive language. The climax of this shift in attitude arrives in December 1820, when he publishes a piece in his magazine, mentioning a John Gibson Lockhart by name, as he believes him to be the editor of Blackwood’s. The second direct and personal attack arrives in January 1821, in an editorial titled ‘The Mohocks’, in which Scott explicitly refers to his suspicions that Lockhart is Blackwood’s editor, and ironises on this matter, mentioning Lockhart’s attempts to deny this accusation:
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We have been told that Mr. John Gibson Lockhart, having been originally included in the action now pending, has given it under his hand, that he is not the Editor of the Magazine. The people of Edinburgh are not surprised at this denial: it is well known there that Doctor Morris, under the assumed name of Christopher North, is the Editor of the work, and the author of its most malignant articles!
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Scott would have known that singling out Lockhart and also calling him a liar would have consequences, and it’s perhaps reasonable to speculate that he was trying to force a confrontation that went beyond words. Lockhart bites the hook and sends his personal friend Jonathan Henry Christie, who lives in London, to demand an apology from Scott, who refuses to backtrack. Lockhart then challenges Scott to a duel but Scott also refuses to grant him this honour, demanding that Lockhart first come clear on whether he is the editor of Blackwood’s or not: if he isn’t, then Scott will apologise; but if he is, this means he was called a liar by Lockhart, and so the duel will take place. Without this clarification Scott refuses to fight, reasoning that the grounds for the duel wouldn’t be transparent.
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And here the feud continues with epistolary and editorial backs and forths. Requests for an apology aren’t fulfilled, clarifications aren’t issued, accusations of ungentlemanly behaviour fly in both directions, until Jonathan Henry Christie writes a statement that John Scott finds personally insulting and now it is Scott who challenges Christie to a duel the same night he learns of the latter’s words. Pressed by Scott’s bravado, Christie has no choice but to accept. The duel is to take place the evening of 16 February, 1821, at the back of the Chalk Farm Tavern, on what is now Regent’s Park Road, in Primrose Hill.
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If the events so far are convoluted, the duel itself is even messier. To understand what happened you need to understand the protocols and procedures that regulated duels two centuries ago.
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The rules of pistol duelling in Britain varied, but there were some common denominators. For example, the duel would be conducted at a prearranged time and location, with each participant standing a set distance apart, each supervised by a representative known as a second. The duellists would face each other armed with pistols loaded with just one bullet and await for the signal to fire (often a handkerchief being dropped). If neither party was injured in the first shot, a second shot could follow. It wasn’t uncommon for duellers to shoot to miss the first time, the point of facing one another being more about displaying courage and honour than about actually killing the other party. And this is exactly what Christie did with his first shot: he intentionally fired wide of the mark. There are different accounts about what happened next, but it’s agreed that Christie’s second (James Traill), who knew Christie had shot to miss, failed to communicate this to Scott’s representative (Scott’s friend, Peter G. Patmore). And so, the pistols were reloaded for a rushed second shot, which took place minutes after the first one. Here Christie aimed properly and hit Scott on the right side ‘between the lowest rib and the hip bone’.
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The wound looked serious enough for drama to ensue, with Scott now learning that Christie had shot to miss the first time, and protesting not being told of Christie’s honourable attitude, since he wouldn’t have stood for a second shot had he known about this important detail. Christie was very remorseful, even holding Scott’s hand while the latter was given medical care, lamenting loudly that he wished it was him who had taken the bullet – the duel was clearly unnecessary and both duellists had by now realised this. Concerned for Scott’s life, the party carried him back to the Chalk Farm Tavern on an improvised stretcher (a shutter or a door), where he took a room and was seen by several doctors. His wife joined him later that night. His prospects looked good at first.
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The Examiner reported the news about the confrontation and published a short article in their February 25 issue:
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Duel.—On Friday week, a duel took place at Chalk Farm, between Mr. John Scott and Mr. Christie, at nine o’clock at night, by the light of the moon. The parties fired twice, Mr. Christie having the first time fired his pistol in the air, according to one account, and not having aimed it at Mr. Scott according to all. Mr. Scott received a ball in the lower part of his body, which remained there for some days and kept him in a dangerous state.
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On February 27, two days after this article, eleven after the duel, Scott unexpectedly succumbed to his wounds, aged just thirty-six. Christie and Traill were tried for manslaughter and acquitted later that same year; Patmore was eventually tried for manslaughter and acquitted too.
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An editorial was published in the April issue of The London Magazine, to mark Scott’s passing. Titled ‘The Lion’s Head’ it starts by informing the public about Scott’s death, concluding with a sobering address to raise money for Scott’s family:
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The hopes which we allowed ourselves to encourage, on the eve of the publication of our last Number, have been but too fatally frustrated:— Mr. John Scott is no more!—The public are so generally informed of the late painful events, and of their dreadful result, as to render it unnecessary for us to make any further communication or remark at present. Having been urgently requested by many of our readers to give a full statement of all the circumstances which led to the last fatal event,—we have but to make known that a judicial inquiry is immediately about to take place; and we are sure that our determination of remaining silent on the subject will be properly regarded. To those persons who have expressed a wish that a Memoir of the late Mr. Scott should be given, we can at present only say, that it is fully intended to publish such a Memoir, either in The London Magazine, or in a separate and more enlarged form. Nothing will be left undone that can in any way tend to satisfy the strong public and private feeling which this calamity has excited. We cannot better employ this part of our Magazine, than in promoting the publicity of the following address; and we confidently trust, that this endeavour to render less poignant, to the widow and children, the effects of a loss which is in itself irreparable, will not prove unavailing.
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Mr. John Scott, whose death has interested a considerable portion of the Public, has left a Widow and Two Children, for whom he was unable to provide. By distinguished talents, as well as by exemplary prudence and industry, he had only just reached the point where he had a near prospect of securing the comfort of those who were dear to him. Some of his friends have thought themselves authorized, in such circumstances, to appeal to the general benevolence of the Public, on behalf of the helpless family of a man of ability and virtue.
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John Scott was succeeded as editor by John Taylor and The London Magazine continued, until it stopped publication once more in 1829. He is buried in the vaults of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, a stone-throw away from his home in Covent Garden. His name might not be known to many, and his career might have been short. But his influence on English and world literature is undeniable, enduring well beyond his needless and untimely death.
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