"The Highwayman" is a romantic ballad poetry written by Alfred Noyes and originally published in the August 1906 edition of Edinburgh, Scotland-based Blackwood's Magazine. It was featured in Noyes' book, Forty Singing Seamen and Other Poems, the next year, and was an instant hit. Noyes began writing poems at an early age and sold his first poem for sixpence to a newspaper when he was only eleven years old. He continued to write throughout his childhood and teenage years, publishing several more collections of poems before turning twenty. In 1898 he went to America where he worked as a reporter for a number of newspapers including The New York Evening Mail and The Boston Post. It was here that he met his future wife, Gertrude Carrington Noyes, who was also working as a journalist. The two married in 1902 and returned to England a few months later. In 1904 Noyes started his own magazine called The Singer. However, after only three issues had been published, he lost interest in it and moved on to other projects such as writing books and songs. One of these songs became "The Highwayman", which was first performed at a private dinner party for some Scottish poets. After its success, Noyes decided to make it into a full-length music hall song with additional verses added by another poet named Henry Hamilton.