He left Cambridge without a degree, and went to London, where he edited The Scourge, a monthly publication, contributed to The Satirist, and engaged in jobbing literary work.
[5] There was doubt at the time as to the date of Clarke's death, with Eneas Mackenzie in 1827 asserting that he was already dead, "unnoticed and unlamented".
Richard Welford in Men of Mark 'twixt Tyne and Tweed (1895) claimed he died in 1817, "seized with madness."
Letters to Richard Alfred Davenport from Canada falsely claim he had emigrated, and was in Chambly, Quebec in 1845.
[2] Clarke contributed to the Tyne Mercury a series of papers, later expanded and published in The Saunterer (Newcastle, 1805, 2nd ed.