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Robert Hope Moncrieff (1846–1927) was a prolific Scottish author of children's fiction and of Black's Guides.

Early life

Robert Hope Moncrieff was born on 26 February 1846, the lawful son of George Moncrieff (11 May 1917 – 16 May 1865), a solicitor and his first wife Angela Birch (19 September 1820 – 25 December 1848). The couple had married the previous year in St Brides Church in Liverpool on 2 June 1845. Robert was quickly followed by a brother, John Forbes (5 July 1847 – 7 March 1927), and a sister, Angela Mary (27 November 1848 – 8 March 1864).

Moncrieff's mother, Angela, died of childbed fever four weeks after the birth of Angela Mary. Moncrieff was under three. His father married a second time on 27 June 1854 to Maria Wilks Williamson Rodgers (1830 – 30 March 1859) in Kilkenny, Ireland. The family now lived at No 7, Atholl Crescent in Perth. Maria gave George three more children: George Henry (2 November 1855 – 23 February 1947); Francis Edward (24 March 1857 – 7 January 1884); and Henrietta (14 June 1858 – 30 April 1859), who died in infancy.

Moncrieff's step-mother, Maria, died when he was just 13, and his father married again before he was 15. His third wife was Isabella Roy (29 October 1828 – 18 January 1879) whom he married on 16 January 1861 in 2, Atholl Crescent. Perth, Scotland. Her father was not a soldier, but the Captain of a ship trading in Asia with the permission of the East India Company.

Moncrieff and his brother were in boarding school by the time their father married for the third time. The 1861 Census shows both Moncrieff (15) and his brother John (13) boarding at the Circus Place School in Edinburgh. This was a highly regarded school which prepared pupils for the Edinburgh Academy. Moncrieff went on to attend the Edinburgh Academy and then the University of Edinburgh.

Moncrieff's father died in 1865, four years after his third marriage. when Moncrieff was 19. Moncrieff wrote nearly fifty years later that his mother had died before he knew her and that: my father also was taken too soon, leaving me precociously independent. Not one of his father's three marriages lasted five years, all ending prematurely with the death of either wife or husband. Moncrieff himself never married.

Writing

Before he was out of his teens, Moncrieff had written and made money by a real book. While he attended the University of Edinburgh he wrote A book about Dominies (1867), Dominies being a term used for schoolmasters in Scotland. This was taken by a publisher, who published it at his own expense with a promise of profit to the author, which proved rather a mirage in the cold light of publishing accounts. It was published anonymously with no author's name given. The book was well reviewed and went into several editions. Moncrieff followed this up with A Book About Boys, (1868) adopting his pseudonym Ascott R. Hope for the first time. Moncrieff was ashamed of some of his early books and went to some expense to withdraw them from circulation.

Moncrieff says that he had have made awkward attempts at more than one handicraft, with the view of gathering straw for literary bricks. He was said to have taken up teaching briefly more with the purpose of studying schoolboys and their ways than to making it a profession.

Moncrieff travelled extensively. Even his census returns in the UK show how much he bounced around:

• 1851 – Living with his widowed father and two siblings in Perth. 5 years old.
• 1861 – At the Circus Place School in Edinburgh with his brother John.
• 1871 – An assistant master at Christ College, Brecon in Wales.
• 1881 – Boarding at 8, Victoria Grove, in Kensington, London. Profession now is Author.
• 1891 – Boarding at Hillside Boarding Lodge in Ventnor on the Isle of Wight. Profession is Author. The 13th edition of Black's Guide to the Isle of Wight, edited by Moncrieff, was published in 1895.
• 1901 – Now 55 years old. Moncrieff was no longer boarding, but was at the head of his own establishment at 85 Munster Road in Fulham, London. No relatives in the house, but the house also holds his 60-year-old housekeeper and her adult daughter. The electoral register show that he was still there in 1907.
• 1911 – Only occupant of 5 Chandos Road, Cricklewood, London, apart from a 52-year-old housekeeper.
• 1927 – On his death at 81 years-of-age he was living at 16a Addison Gardens, Kensington, London.

Moncrieff not only travelled the whole of Great Britain, but he also travelled internationally. He wrote: It has been by lot to be a good deal about the world from an early age. After a boyish visit to Paris, my travels began with a cruise in the Mediterranean and a stay in Italy, still heaving from Garibaldi's exploits. Moncrieff travelled, and visited four continents. He even tried his hand at farming in Canada, but soon abandoned it. All of his travels contributed not only to the background for his books, but also supported his books on geography and history. Moncrieff suffered from short-sightedness and this led him to favour occupations such as walking and riding. And these leisurely pursuits allowed him to make observations that he made use of when writing on topographical topics.

His study of the geography of the world, The world of to-day : a survey of the lands and peoples of the globe as seen in travel and commerce (1905) took him five years, and was updated every two years or so. Moncrieff wrote every word of the six volumes, bar a single page.

Moncrieff was a member of first the Savile and later of the Athenaeum. He was of a kindly nature and always ready to do good to others, but in a discreet way. He wrote that his work seldom brought him into contact with fellow authors, and that still less had he cultivated what is called smart society. His view of the world's affairs was mainly that of a looker-on. He wrote: I have lived my life in my own way, and that his writing was the sum of his accomplishments.

Death

Moncrieff died at Eltham, London, England, on 10 August 1927. He was living at 16a Addison Gardens in Kensington, London at the time. He left an estate valued at £11,482 14s 6d. His half-brother George survived him by 20 years.

Short stories and serials

Moncrieff contributed stories to numerous Boy's Papers and Magazines. He has stories in the first issues of the Boy's Own Paper and Union Jack. The following is a very incomplete list, drawn from Steve Holland's British Juvenile Story Papers and Pocket Libraries Index. Some of the stories, like Dick's Dog, later reappeared in books of stories by Moncrieff.

Books other than Black's Guides

In the semi-autobiographical A Book About Authors (1914) Moncrieff wrote that: For more than forty years I have been an author of all work, what the contemptuous call a hack... His range was very broad and included:

• School stories for boys
• Serial stories in boy's papers
• Translations of works in other languages. Moncrieff says he spent his time when travelling learning other languages and translating works in them.
• Books about religion – including martyrdom and religious persecution
• Entertaining essays – about being a teacher, about school boys, etc.
• Encyclopedic and instructional works – about animals, history, or geography, etc.
• Black's Guides for tourists

This following section lists the guides that Moncrieff worked on, while this section lists books other than the guides.

Black's Guides

Adam and Charles Black published an extensive series of guides known as Black's Guides, as well as illustrated books describing different localities. Although Moncrieff is usually credited as the editor, the work was more involved than the term editor would suggest. Moncrieff said: I have edited, that is mainly written, or re-written, some dozens of guide-books, most of them appearing in successive editions. The list of those which could be found in searches on the Jisc Library Hub Discover, which aggregates catalogues for academic libraries, and libraries of record in the UK and Ireland. The differences between the editions were not trivial, and sometimes involved a complete rewrite. The more popular books were revised more often than the less popular books, as changes in railways, towns and cities, and in hotels and attractions brought the need for new editions. The table below is not exhaustive as not all of the different editions are held in the libraries.

The guides fall into two broad categories:

• Books with a great deal of colour illustration with notes, such as Bonnie Scotland (1904), later republished as Scotland (1922). This had 75 leaves of colour illustrations from paintings by Harold Sutton Palmer. The notes did not so much describe the views painted, but put them in a historical and literary context, together with railway directions.
• The Guides proper: Books that serve as tour guides, with maps, and accounts of places of interest, and journeys, be they on foot along the coast, or by rail or road.

Notes

1. Ascott was never part of his name, but was adopted by him as part of his pseudonym. It may have been a punning reference to his origin A Scot. He used the name A. R. Hope Moncrieff for some of his books for adults, including the semi-autobiographical A Book About Authors.
2. The census shows that Maria Rodgers was born in Scotland. Her father was a staff officer, and presumably was posted to Ireland at the time.
3. The house is now occupied by the Perth Citizens' Advice Bureau. Archived 2017-05-24 at the Wayback Machine
4. The cause of death was given as hydrocephalus on the register of deaths.
5. The death register gives the cause as consumption (this usually means what is now called Tuberculosis) of some twelve months duration.
6. This house was occupied by Jane Hope Oliphant (31 July 1773 – 24 January 1861), the widow of a former officer of the East India Company. Mrs. Oliphant was rich, judging by the large number of servants she kept (housekeeper, cook, plus two female and two male servants), and generous, judging by her frequent subscriptions to good causes. Isabella's sisters, Margaret Isabel (14 October 1826 – 17 July 1879), and Mary Euphemia (5 April 1830 – 10 October 1866) were also married from this house. The house was sold for £3,225 in March 1861.
7. The death register says that he died of consumption which he had suffered from for several years
8. Moncrieff turned 20 in February 1866, so this book must have been published in 1864 or 1865. Oudendale: A story of schoolboy life is the most likely candidate, as the two other works dated for these years are a 24 page pamphlet for the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge in 1864 and a book on school life in France in 1865. The Oxford Companion to Children's Literature (1991, p.259) describes the plot as follows: Charlie Campion, a pupil at Oudendale College, shows 'pluckiness' in standing up to bullies, but gets into bad company; he drinks and smokes, and causes grave anxiety to Dr. Eden the head master. He is rescued by the good effects of Confirmation – whereupon he falls off a cliff and dies a holy death. Oudendale: A story of schoolboy life at the HathiTrust Digital Library
9. Moncrieff never placed another book with that publisher.
10. Given as Westminster in the catalogue, but examination of the original on Google Books shows that the name is Whitminster.
11. In A Book About Authors Moncrieff says that a fiction of his describing from materials supplied me the life of an Argentine settler, passed hardly doubted for fact (p.11)

References

1. City and Parishes of Perth (4 April 1846). "February 1846: No. 84". Register of Births and Baptisms. Retrieved 9 March 2020.
2. Liverpool Record Office (2 June 1845). "Reference 283 BRI/3/3". Liverpool, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754-1932. Liverpool: Liverpool Records Office. p. 208.
3. Parish of Kinnoull. "(Old Parish Registers: Deaths 369/50 538 Kinnoull)". Register of Deaths. National Records of Scotland. p. 538.
4. "India Office Family History Search  >  Search Results  >  Record details: Isabella Roy: Birth". British Library: India Office: Family History Search. Retrieved 9 March 2020.
5. "Wills and Probates 1858-1996: Pages for Roy and Year of Death 1879. p283". Find a Will Service. Retrieved 9 March 2020.
6. "India Office Family History Search  >  Search Results  >  Record details: Peter Roy: Marriage". British Library: India Office: Family History Search. Retrieved 9 March 2020.
7. "India Office Family History Search  >  Search Results  >  Record details: Peter Roy: Biography". British Library: India Office: Family History Search. Retrieved 9 March 2020.
8. Alexander Dallas Bache (1839). Report on Education in Europe: To the Trustees of the Girard College for Orphans. Printed by Lydia R. Bailey. pp. 196–198. ISBN 9780608435053.
9. ^ ""Ascott R. Hope" Dead". Northern Whig (Saturday 13 August 1927): 10. 13 August 1927.
10. Isabella survived him by 14 years.
11. Moncrieff, A. R. Hope (1914). "Introduction - The Author". A book About Authors: Reflections and Recollections of a Book-Wright. p. 5.
12. ^ Moncrieff, A. R. Hope (1914). "Introduction - The Author". A book About Authors: Reflections and Recollections of a Book-Wright. p. 2.
13. Moncrieff, A. R. Hope (1914). "Introduction - The Author". A book About Authors: Reflections and Recollections of a Book-Wright. p. 3.
14. Moncrieff, A. R. Hope (1914). "Introduction - The Author". A book About Authors: Reflections and Recollections of a Book-Wright. p. 6.
15. ^ Moncrieff, A. R. Hope (1914). "Introduction - The Author". A book About Authors: Reflections and Recollections of a Book-Wright. p. 12.
16. "Ascott R. Hope". Hartlepool Northern Daily Mail (Saturday 13 August 1927): 5. 13 August 1927.
17. "Books Received Yesterday". Westminster Gazette (Tuesday 28 May 1895): 6. 28 May 1895.
18. ^ Moncrieff, A. R. Hope (1914). "Introduction - The Author". A book About Authors: Reflections and Recollections of a Book-Wright. p. 8.
19. ^ Moncrieff, A. R. Hope (1914). "Introduction - The Author". A book About Authors: Reflections and Recollections of a Book-Wright. p. 9.
20. Holland, Steve (25 August 2019). "British Juvenile Story Papers and Pocket Libraries Index". British Juvenile Story Papers and Pocket Libraries Index. Archived from the original on 19 February 2020. Retrieved 5 February 2020.
21. Jisc. "About Library Hub Discover". Library Hub Discover. Archived from the original on 3 March 2020. Retrieved 9 March 2020.

External links

• Works by Robert Hope Moncrieff at Project Gutenberg
• Works by Moncrieff at the Internet Archive
• Works by Moncrieff online at the Hathi Trust.
• Works by Moncrieff online at the British Library.

• 1846 births
• 1927 deaths
• Alumni of the University of Edinburgh
• People educated at Edinburgh Academy
• 19th-century Scottish writers
• 19th-century Scottish novelists
• Scottish children's writers
• Scottish short story writers
• Scottish historical novelists
• Scottish travel writers
• Writers from Edinburgh
• Victorian novelists
• 19th-century pseudonymous writers