Author, Historian, and Diplomat

Diedrich Knickerbocker. Born into a successful New York City family, Washington Irving trained as a lawyer and went into partnership with one of his brothers. After publishing twenty numbers of the miscellany Salmagundi with his brother William and friend James K. Paulding in 1807 and 1808, Irving first gained fame as a writer through his satiric A History of New-York (1809), published under the fictitious name Diedrich Knickerbocker. In spite of the pseudonym, A History of New-York made him well known in New York. He was named the editor of the Analectic magazine in 1814 and resigned a year later to become aide-de-camp to the governor of New York in the closing stages of the War of 1812. In 1815 he traveled to Liverpool to look in on his family's interests there and did not return to the United States until 1832.

Travels. While living in England, Irving...