Early Life
Horne was born at Edmonton, London, son of James Horne (died 1810), a quarter-master in the 61st Regiment. Horne was raised at the home of his rich paternal grandmother and sent to a school at Edmonton and then to Sandhurst, as he was designed for the army. Horne appears to have had as little sense of discipline as Adam Lindsay Gordon showed at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, and like him was asked to leave. It appears that he caricatured the headmaster, and took part in a rebellion. He began writing while still in his teens, but he was intended for the army, and entered at Sandhurst, but receiving no commission, he left his country and in 1825 went as a midshipman to the Mexican expedition, was taken prisoner and joined the Mexican navy. He served in the war against Spain, traveled in the United States and Canada, returned to England in 1827, and took up literature as a profession.
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