Author: Brewer, George
Biography:
BREWER, George (c. 1766-1828: ancestry.co.uk)
A prolific author, George Brewer left few traces in public records. However, ESTC and Brewer’s RLF file give a birth year of 1766 and he may have been the George Brewer, son of John Brewer and his wife Rosamond Fowkes, who was born in London on 10 Oct. 1766 and baptised at St. Martin-in-the-Fields on 6 Nov. In the early 1790s he served in the Royal Navy. His first publication was Tom Weston, a Novel (1791); the preface describes the author as “educated in misfortune, and the constant slave of hope and disappointment.” The book was issued by subscription and includes a brief list of mainly London-based subscribers. Brewer subsequently tried his hand at a range of genres, with essays, plays, political pamphlets, and biography. His publications include Maxims of Gallantry (1793), How to be Happy, a Comedy (1794), Bannian Day, a Musical Entertainment (1796), Siamese Tales for the Instruction of Youth (1797), The Man in the Moon (1799), Rights of the Poor (1800) Prospectus of a New Law Between Debtor and Creditor (1806), Hours of Leisure (1806), The Witch of Ravensworth (1808), and The Juvenile Lavater (1815). He also contributed verse and essays to periodicals. Despite all this activity, he struggled financially. Brewer applied to the RLF on 7 Nov. 1804, stating that he was about to be imprisoned in the King’s Bench for debt. The Fund awarded him 8 guineas but by the time Brewer wrote on 19 Nov. to acknowledge the payment he was already in prison. Records show that he had five creditors and owed just one of them over £327. He was discharged on 1 Feb. 1806. By 1811 he was again in trouble and was imprisoned on 27 Apr. Brewer applied to the RLF for help but there is no record of payment. At some point between 1811 and 1819 when he published Pleasantries: In Rhyme and Prose, he moved to Derby. The poems tell us that he was not married, had a pet parrot, once spoke verses as “Peter Fog” at the Union Masquerade (held annually in Westminster), and gave lectures in Ashbourne, Derbyshire. He may have been the George Brewer who died in Derby in 1828, aged 61, and was buried in the churchyard of St. Michael’s on 18 May. (ancestry.co.uk 29 Jan. 2025; findmypast.co.uk 29 Jan. 2025; ESTC; RLF file 162) SR