Author: Agg, John
Biography:
AGG, John (1783-1855: ancestry.com)
pseudonyms Humphrey HEDGEHOG, Jeremiah JUVENAL, Peter PINDAR, Jr.
Son of John and Ann Agg, he was born in Evesham. He began a colourful career as a writer, printer, bookseller, and publisher in Evesham and Bristol. The Dawn of Liberty (Bristol, 1808) seems to have been his first publication; he subsequently turned his hand to many kinds of hack writing, including fiction. Shoberl (1816) describes him as having been recently imprisoned in London for a libel. In 1818 he emigrated to the US, living first in Philadelphia, where he published The Ocean Harp, and then in Washington DC. He married Elizabeth Blackford (1800-54) in 1820. As an official parliamentary reporter from 1825 to 1837 he recorded the debates in Congress. He died in Washington and is buried there in Rock Creek Cemetery. A collection devoted to him and his works from 1813 onwards was acquired by Duke University in 2017. The attribution of all of the pseudonymous works to Agg is still largely speculative. ("Guide to the Harold Moser Collection," David M. Rubinstein Rare Books & Manuscript Library, Duke University; Shoberl; ancestry.com 27 Nov. 2019) HJ