James Ewing Ritchie was an English journalist and writer.

Born in Wrentham, Suffolk, the son of congregational minister Reverend Andrew Ritchie, he was educated at University College, London before he turned to journalism. He edited and owned some periodicals, including 'The Principality' and 'The Illustrated News of the World'.

He subsequently became an author of travel books and political biographies (notably Cobden, Gladstone, and Victoria) . Seven of his travel books were about nineteenth-century London. He also wrote a single novel, 'Crying for the Light' (1895), about a country girl pursued by a bad baronet but rescued by an honest journalist. He successfully applied to the Royal Literary Fund after he lost money on some of his periodical ventures.

He also used the pseudonym Christopher Crayon.

He married Annie Elms and the couple had five children.

As a Liberal Unionist, he stood unsuccessfully for Parliament in 1885.

He died of asthma in the Clacton-on-Sea, Essex in the September quarter of 1898.

Note: No definite date of death is known so the first day of the September quarter in which he died is given above so that the entry for date of death can be recorded.