Early Career
Charles Cameron was the son of Walter Cameron, a London carpenter, speculative builder and a member of London Carpenter's Company. He claimed descent from the Camerons of Lochiel, a Scottish clan deeply involved in the Jacobite rising of 1745. Cameron used the Lochiel coat of arms for his personal bookplate, although modern researchers since David Talbot Rice question or deny his claims for Lochiel lineage. Researchers also disagree on the exact year of Cameron's birth, which may be either 1743, 1745 or 1746.
Cameron trained in London with his father and with architect Isaac Ware. After Ware's death in 1766 Cameron settled on continuing his late master's work on a new edition of Lord Burlington's Fabbriche Antiche, a project that required personal studies and surveys of ancient Roman architecture. He spent 1767 in London, preparing prints of works by Andrea Palladio, and arrived in Rome in 1768. There, he surveyed the Baths of Titus and Nero's Domus Aurea, digging into subterranean remains that were rediscovered only in the 20th century. According to Dmitry Shvidkovsky, Cameron met in Rome with another Charles Cameron, a Jacobite and a true member of the Lochiel clan, and "borrowed" the life story of the latter to embellish his own. Cameron returned from Italy around 1769 and published the results of his studies in 1772 (reissues 1774, 1775) under the title The Baths of the Romans explained and illustrated... with proper scientific commentaries in English and French.
Cameron's life between 1769 and his departure to Russia in 1779 remains barely known. Archives attest to his involvement in only one construction contract in London, for an Adam style building in Hanover Square (1770–1775). Walter Cameron, the main contractor, was ruined by litigation with the property owner and had to sell his son's art collection to raise funds. Charles sued his father, who was jailed in Fleet Prison for debt. In 1791, when Cameron applied for a membership in the Architect's Club of London, he was barred admission due to this and other episodes that had stained his reputation in England.
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