Born on 24 July 1798, he was descended from the Napiers of Merchiston. His father was Francis Napier, a writer to the signet in Edinburgh, and his mother was Mary Elizabeth Jane Douglas, eldest daughter of Colonel Archibald Hamilton of Innerwick, Haddingtonshire.
He was educated at Edinburgh High School and the university of Edinburgh, and passed advocate at the Scottish bar in 1820.
He was called to the Bar, practised as an advocate, and was made Sheriff of Dumfries and Galloway. Napier wrote from a strongly Cavalier and Jacobite standpoint. He published Memoirs of the Napiers, of Montrose, and of Graham of Claverhouse, the last of which gave rise to controversy.
Founded in 1843 the club is one of the world"s first photographic clubs.
His great-grandfather Francis Napier, 6th Lord Napier had five sons, of whom the youngest, Mark, a major-general in the army, was the grandfather of the biographer. In the 1830s Mark Napier is listed as an advocate living at 11 Stafford Street in Edinburgh"s west education
In 1844 Napier was appointed sheriff-depute of Dumfriesshire, to which Galloway was subsequently added, and he held office for the rest his life.
Faculty of Advocates]
Napier was a member of the Edinburgh Calotype Club and the Photographic Society of Scotland. He died at his residence at Ainslie Place, Edinburgh, on 23 November 1879, as the oldest member of the Faculty of Advocates then discharging legal duties.
