Leslie Alexis Marchand (February 13, 1900 – July 11, 1999) was an American scholar of English literature, who is chiefly notable for his contribution to the study of the Romantic poet Lord Byron, in particular his twelve-volume edition of Byron's Letters and Journals, published between 1973 and 1982, with a supplementary volume in 1994, and Byron: a Biography (Alfred A. Knopf, 1957).
Born in Washington in 1900, Leslie A. Marchand's "parents were French-speaking immigrants to the United States, and Leslie always liked to hear the French echo by stressing the second syllable of his name.
[2] After graduation, he took up a teaching position at Farthest North College in Alaska (Alaska Agricultural College and School of Mines), where he lectured on English and French literature.
[2] Recognizing that manuscripts related to Lord Byron were likely to be scattered across Europe, Marchand set out to gather whatever he could find and to make previously unpublished materials available to the scholarly community.
Serendipity played a role in his success in this endeavor: Perhaps the most dramatic find of all was at a bookshop, where the owner mentioned that he had some things from Ockham Park, home of Byron's grandson, the Earl of Lovelace.