underwriter, which he had pursued concurrently for some years (ib.) At first his ventures were confined to the insurance of ships engaged in the coal trade, ‘and success attended the step, because the risques were fair and the premiums adequate.’ But after a time he engaged in larger and more hazardous speculations, and became a member of Lloyd's rooms. ‘I was,’ he wrote in 1799, ‘twelve years an underwriter in Lloyd's Coffee House, and subscribed my name to six millions of property; but was weighed down, in common with above half those who were engaged in the protection of property, by the host of foes this nation had to combat in the American war’ (Letter of John Walter to Lord Kenyon, 6 July 1799, in Hist. MSS. Comm. 14th Rep. App. pt. iv. p. 551). In the beginning of 1782 (Mr. W. Blades, in the article in Macmillan's Magazine above quoted, puts the date as 1781) he called his creditors together and announced his bankruptcy. The bankruptcy was an honourable one, and the creditors had such confidence in Walter's uprightness and integrity that they appointed him to collect the debts due to the estate, and made him a present of all the household furniture, plate, and effects of the house in Queen Square, Bloomsbury, in which he was living at the time (ib.) It appears, however, that his ‘valuable library’ was sold for the benefit of the creditors (ib. ut sup.). He had previously lived for some ten years at Battersea Rise, but had quitted that ‘desirable residence’ when his affairs became involved (The Case of Mr. John Walter, ut sup.) The creditors suffered little in the end; but Walter was practically ruined.
Compelled thus to begin life again, Walter at first sought an official situation under the government. Although he possessed influential recommendations and powerful patronage, his hopes were shattered by the resignation of Lord North in 1782, and he forthwith turned his attention in an entirely new direction. In 1782 he had made the acquaintance of Henry Johnson, who had devised and patented in 1778 and 1780 a new method of printing by means of ‘logotypes,’ or founts composed of complete words instead of separate letters (Nos. 1201 and 1266). Walter was greatly impressed by the invention, the patent rights of which he purchased from Johnson, and himself contributed by new devices to its further development. In 1784 he purchased the premises in Printing House Square, the former site of the monastery of the black friars, and subsequently of the Blackfriars Theatre, which, constructed in 1596, was in 1609 occupied by Shakespeare's company. Here also John Bill had founded and printed the ‘London Gazette’ (Fraser Rae in Nineteenth Century, January 1885). This building was known as the King's Printing Office, and was successively occupied by Bill, by several members of the family of Baskett or Basket, and by the firm of Eyre & Strahan until they removed to New Street in 1770. The original building was burnt down in 1737. Some years ago, when ‘The Times’ office was reconstructed, ‘a large quantity of half-burnt leaves of the Prayer-book printed by John Baskett, the king's printer, were found there’ (The Times, 2 Jan. 1888). When Walter purchased the premises they had been unoccupied since 1770, but they still belonged to a member of the Basket family, for on 17 May 1784 Walter issued an advertisement which ran as follows: ‘Logographic Office, Blackfriars. Mr. Walter begs leave to inform the public that he has purchased the printing-house formerly occupied by Mr. Basket, near Apothecaries' Hall, which will be opened the first day of next month for printing by words entire, under his Majesty's patent’ (Macmillan's Magazine, ut sup.) The purchase-money appears to have been derived from a present made to Walter by his creditors on the settlement of his bankruptcy. Here, from the beginning, in buildings enlarged and reconstructed from time to time until they have now absorbed the whole of Printing House Square, the business of ‘The Times’ has been continually carried on at a place which has been associated with printing in name and in fact for more than two centuries.
At first Walter, in partnership with Johnson, only undertook the printing of books, relying on the ‘logographic’ process for great improvements in the mechanism and economy of printing which he confidently expected to prove a national benefit, and frequently represented in appeals to the public as his title to the gratitude of the nation. His robust faith in the ‘logographic’ process, however, brought him as little profit, and probably as much anxiety, as his ventures in underwriting. In 1785 he was elected a member of the Society of Arts, and in the same year he brought the new process to the notice of the society, with the result that the printing of the third volume of its ‘Transactions’ was entrusted to him (see preface, and Minutes of Society, 11 Feb., 16 and 23 March 1785).
It has been stated that John Walter first learned the art of printing in the office of
