James Smillie, engraver and etcher, was born in Edinburgh, Scotland on 23 November 1807. He was the second of the four sons of David Smillie, Sr. At the age of twelve-years-old, James was apprenticed to a silver engraver in Edinburgh for ten months and then to the pictorial engraver, Edward Mitchel, for a brief few months. The Smillie family set sail for Canada on 6 June 1821 and settled in Quebec. Young James floundered as he assisted his family with their bakery and then joined his brother David in the business of making military ornaments, all the while wanting to return to pictorial engraving which he felt was his calling. In 1823, James slowly taught himself the etching progress and eventually was commissioned to engrave a map of Upper Canada which measured six feet by three feet. In October 1827 Smillie set sail for London where he studied engraving with Andrew Wilson. Smillie first visited New York City in 1829 and moved there in 1830 hopeful that he could make a living in the urban metropolis. He soon made his reputation as an engraver of the American landscape as well as engraving banknote vignettes. He worked for the American Banknote Company and by the late 1840s was one of preeminent landscape engravers in the United States. Smillie married Catherine Van Valkenburg in 1832 and the couple had two sons, James David and George Henry. Both sons became noted American artists. James Smillie was elected an Associate of the National Academy of Design in 1832 and was elevated to Academician in 1851. He died in Poughkeepsie, New York on 4 December 1885.