James Peller Malcolm

James Peller Malcolm (1767–1815) was an American-English topographer and engraver.

Son of a merchant in Philadelphia, he was born there in August 1767. He was admitted to the Quaker school; but his family left to avoid the fighting in American War of Independence, and his education was mostly at Pottstown, Pennsylvania. He returned with his family to Philadelphia in 1784, after the conclusion of peace. Acting on the advice of Mr. Bembridge, a relative and fellow-student of Benjamin West, he went to London, and pursued artistic studies for two years in the Royal Academy. Finding that history painting and landscape painting were not much in demand, he took to engraving and the compilation of books on topographical and historical subjects. He was elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.

He died in Gee Street, Clarendon Square, London, on 5 April 1815, leaving his mother and wife unprovided for.

Many of his engravings are in the Gentleman's Magazine, from 1792 to 1814. His Excursions through Kent and works in John Nichols's History of Leicestershire, were long-term projects. He engraved and published three views of Leathersellers' Hall, on the site of the monastery of St. Helen's, London, and two large plates of the inside of the Middle Temple Hall, and one external view, under the auspices of the society.

Malcolm's major work was Londinium Redivivum, or an Antient History and Modern Description of London, compiled from Parochial Records, Archives of various Foundations, the Harleian MSS. and other authentic Sources (4 vols. London 1802–7). It was a parochial history compiled from original records, such as vestry-books, churchwardens' accounts, and parochial registers. The dean and chapter of St Paul's Cathedral gave him free access to their archives. The work is accompanied by forty-seven plates.

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