Maxwell, James, 1720-1800
James Maxwell was born on May 9, 1720 at Auchenback, in Renfrewshire, Scottland. At the age of twenty, he left Scotland for England where he worked many different jobs to include: packman, weaver, clerk, usher, schoolmaster, and stonebreaker. He moved back to Scotland where he sold his own publications and pamphlets. The town council of Paisley, in 1787, voted to give him a pension and make him the town’s official poet. His works include: Divine Miscellanies; or, Sacred Poem (Birmingham, 1756,) Happiness. A Moral Essay shewing the Vain Pursuits of Mankind after Happiness…(Paisley, 1786,) Paisley. A Poem. Being a General Description of the Town (Paisley, 1785,) On the French Revolution. A Moral Essay on the Rights of man (Paisley, 1792,) and A Brieft Narrative, or, Some Remarks on the Life of James Maxwell, Poet, in Paisley, an autobiographical poem, written in his seventy-sixth year (Paisley, 1795.) From his autobiographical poem, he stated that he had married and had at least one son, but other than that, there is little known about his family. James Maxwell died in Spring of 1800.