The son of Archibald Prentice of Covington Mains in the Upper Ward of Lanarkshire, and Helen, daughter of John Stoddart of The Bank, a farm in the parish of Carnwath, he was born in November 1792.
Two years later he was appointed traveller to the house in England, and in 1815 Grahame, acting on his advice, moved his business from Glasgow to Manchester, and at the same time brought Prentice into partnership in the firm.
His handling the paper was controversial, and on 14 July 1831 an action for libel was brought against him by one Captain Grimshawe, of whom he had said that he gave indecent toasts at public dinners.
Biographer Paul Ziegler says that Although his newspapers turned a profit in their early years, his single-minded use of them for reformist causes, to the exclusion of lighter and more attractive features, drove down circulation, and his propagandizing alienated many.
[2]Towards the close of 1836 an anti-corn-law association was started in London by Joseph Hume and other parliamentary radicals; Prentice suggested that the centre of agitation should be transferred to Manchester.
[3] George Wilson came to play a role as moderator of the radical tactics of Prentice, who did not hold a prominent official position in the League, and who fell out with Richard Cobden.
[citation needed] The new venture had a major impact on the Manchester Times;[2] and in 1847 Prentice sold out his stake in the paper.
He edited in 1822 The Life of Alexander Reid, a Scotish [sic] Covenanter, and was the author of Historical Sketches and Personal Recollections of Manchester, published in 1851, and A History of the Anti-Corn-Law League, London, 1853.