Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Payne, John (d.1787)
PAYNE, JOHN (d. 1787), publisher, whose brother Henry was a bookseller in Pall Mall, established himself in Paternoster Row, at first by himself, but afterwards in partnership with Joseph Bouquet (Nichols, Lit. Anecd. ix. 668). He became intimate with Dr. Johnson, and was elected a member of the Rambler Club in Ivy Lane, which was formed by Johnson in the winter of 1749 (ib. ix. 502, 779). When Johnson started the ‘Rambler,’ in March 1750, Payne agreed to give him two guineas for each paper as it appeared, and to admit him to a share of the profits arising from the sale of the collected work (Timperley, Encyclopædia, 2nd edit. p. 678). The bargain proved profitable.
Meanwhile Payne had been admitted to the service of the Bank of England on 7 March 1744. In 1769 he was a chief clerk, in 1773 deputy accountant-general, and in 1780 accountant-general, a post which he held until 1785 (Royal Kalendars).
But through life Payne retained an interest in the publishing business (cf. Nichols, iii. 223). In 1785 he arranged to print an English translation of Thomas à Kempis's ‘Imitatio.’ He wrote and published: 1. ‘New Tables of Interest,’ oblong 16mo, London, 1758, a useful compilation, for which Johnson wrote a preface. 2. ‘A Letter occasioned by the Lord Bishop of Gloucester's [Warburton] “Doctrine of Grace,”’ 8vo, London, 1763 (ib. v. 620). An anonymous ‘Letter to a modern Defender of Christianity,’ 12mo, London, 1771, attributed to a John Payne in Halkett and Laing's ‘Dictionary,’ p. 1373, may be by the accountant-general. His letters to Dr. Thomas Birch, extending from 1752 to 1754, are in Additional MS. 4316 in the British Museum. He died unmarried at Lympston, near Exeter, on 10 March 1787 (Probate Act Book, P.C.C. 1787; will registered in P.C.C. 142, Major; information from the Bank of England).
Payne has been confused with another John Payne (fl. 1800), compiler, who also began his career as a publisher in Paternoster Row. After 1760 he entered into partnership with Joseph Johnson [q. v.], and continued with him until 1770, when nearly the whole of their property was consumed by fire (Timperley, pp. 836, 838 n.) Payne then betook himself to Marsham Street, Westminster, and turned author. He is described as an ‘indefatigable manufacturer’ of books, issued in weekly numbers under the high-sounding names of ‘George Augustus Hervey,’ ‘William Frederick Melmoth,’ &c. (Dict. of Living Authors, 1816, p. 265). Under the former pseudonym he issued a creditable ‘Naval, Commercial, and General History of Great Britain, from the earliest time to the rupture with Spain in 1779,’ in 5 vols. 8vo (Rivers, Literary Memoirs of Living Authors, ii. 117). His own avowed compilations, the first two of which were published by Johnson, are: 1. ‘Universal Geography,’ 2 vols. fol. London, 1791, with maps and copperplates, a work which occupied him eight years. 2. ‘An Epitome of History,’ 2 vols. 8vo, London, 1794–5 (a second edition of vol. i. appeared in 1795). 3. ‘Geographical Extracts,’ 8vo, London, 1796. 4. ‘A concise History of Greece,’ 8vo, London, 1800, of which the first volume only was issued (Reuss, Reg. of Authors, 1790–1803, ii. 177).
[Boswell's Life of Johnson, ed. Croker, 1848, pp. 58 n., 78, 79; authorities cited in the text.]