author
active 1852-1870 William Duthie
A working-class London goldsmith who turned travel and hard-won learning into lively Victorian prose and poetry. His writing drew on years in Europe and found a place in popular 19th-century magazines as well as his own books.
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A Tramp's Wallet stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France
by active 1852-1870 William Duthie
About the author
William Duthie was an English author and poet active in the mid-19th century. Sources describe him as a London-born goldsmith from a working-class background who educated himself through a Mechanics' Institution before building a literary career.
After losing his job, he spent several years in Hamburg and traveled in Europe. Those experiences shaped much of his writing, including travel pieces and verse, and later fed into books such as A Tramp’s Wallet and The Pearl of the Rhone.
Duthie also contributed to well-known Victorian periodicals, including Household Words and Belgravia. Even though many details of his life remain uncertain, the surviving record suggests a writer whose work was closely tied to self-education, travel, and everyday social experience.