Biography of John Walter II

John Walter II was born on February 23, 1776, the second son of John Walter I, the founder of The Times, and Frances Walter. He was educated at Merchant Taylors’ School and Trinity College, Oxford, which he entered in 1795 apparently destined for holy orders. However, in 1797 his father withdrew him from Oxford and brought him into the management of The Times. John Walter I had retired to Teddington in 1795 and his eldest son, William, was in charge of the day to day running of the paper. In 1803 William was removed from his position as his management was not successful. His brother became the paper’s sole manager, acting for some years as its editor as well. On his father’s death on November 16, 1812 he became the proprietor of The Times.

It was due to his involvement that The Times blossomed into the newspaper it became. On his initiative The Times began to develop its network of foreign correspondents from 1807, Henry Crabb Robinson being the first. It was the first newspaper to develop such arrangements for obtaining foreign news. The government did not always like this independent source of information and Walter also had to develop systems for getting his correspondents’ letters past the government officers at the ports of entry into Britain. At a great cost this independence was ultimately vindicated and The Times emerged from the struggle as the leading journal in Europe. Often reports of events appeared in the paper before the government received the intelligence from its official sources.

Walter also developed the newspaper in other areas. He cultivated the policy of anonymity. The views expressed in the paper were those of The Times and the personality of the individual writer was absorbed into the corporate unity of the paper. He also invented the “special correspondent” and practically introduced the “leading article”. It was also during his proprietorship that the first editor, in the modern definition of the word, was appointed when Thomas Barnes took charge of the paper in 1817 aged 31. When Barnes died in 1841, Walter appointed in his place another young man, John Thadeus Delane, aged only 23, who became an equally famous name in the history of journalism.

Walter’s influence on The Times also extended to the production of the paper. In 1814 he installed Koenig & Bauer printing presses at Printing House Square. They were the ever first steam printing presses, described in the leading article announcing the feat as “the greatest improvement connected with printing since the discovery of the art itself”, and could print at about 1,100 unperforated sheets an hour. The machines were installed in secret as Walter feared sabotage by print workers fearful of losing their jobs. On the first night that the machines were to print The Times, November 28, 1814, Walter instructed the print workers to stand by as he was expecting important news to arrive from the Continent. The next morning he went into the press room and announced to his astonished workforce that the paper had already been printed — by steam.

Outside The Times, John Walter found the time to be a Member of Parliament on two occasions, for Berkshire from 1832 to 1837 and for Nottingham from 1841 to 1842. Walter had been bound as an apprentice at the Stationers’ Company in 1790 and rose to become Master in 1846. He married twice. Firstly to Elizabeth Anne Gregory and secondly to Mary Smithe.

John Walter II died at Printing House Square on July 28, 1847. He was succeeded as the paper’s proprietor by his eldest son, John Walter III.

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