George Webber (poet)

George Webber was a Newfoundlander poet. Born in Newfoundland, he wrote several poems that saw circulation in British Canada. He later opened a newspaper in Harbour Grace.

George Webber
Bornc. 1820
Harbour Grace, Newfoundland
DiedUnknown
NationalityBritish
OccupationPoet, newspaperman

Biography

Webber was born in the Newfoundland (then a British dominion) in the early 19th century. Sources do not relate his birth date or year, but the Dictionary of Canadian Biography speculates he was born in Harbour Grace in the 1820s. Following his education, Webber traveled throughout Newfoundland and Canada before settling down.[1]

By 1851 Webber had become affiliated with several local newspapers in St. John's. His first poem, "Seal song" was published in a local paper to commemorate the start of the 1851 sealing season, and was well received. Webber also published another poem, "The last of the aborigines", commemorating the decline of the Beothuk people of Newfoundland.[2] The poem portrayed the Beothuks in a heroic light, while it portrayed the white colonizers of Newfoundland as unsavory. This second poem was more controversial, but saw some circulation in Newfoundland.[3][4]

In 1856 Webber opened his own newspaper, the Conception-Bay Man. The paper continued until 1859, but Webber's name drops from the historical record after 1857.[1][2]

References
  1. "Biography – WEBBER, GEORGE – Volume VIII (1851-1860) – Dictionary of Canadian Biography". www.biographi.ca. Retrieved 2020-08-23.
  2. Conception-Bay Man (Harbour Grace, Nfld.), 3 Sept. 1856–16 Feb. 1859. Morning Post, and Shipping Gazette, 1851. F. G. Speck, Beothuk and Micmac (New York, 1922). E. J. Devereux, “The Beothuk Indians of Newfoundland in fact and fiction,” Dalhousie Rev. (Halifax), 50 (1970–71): 350–62. W. A. Munn, “Harbour Grace history, chapter twenty-three: concluded,” Newfoundland Quarterly (St John’s), 39 (1939–40), no.2: 10.
  3. Polack, Fiona (2018-06-12). Tracing Ochre: Changing Perspectives on the Beothuk. University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-1-4426-2386-6.
  4. "George Webber's "The Last of the Aborigines" Introduced by E.J. Devereux". canadianpoetry.org. Retrieved 2020-08-23.
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