Author: Mann, William
Biography:
MANN, William (1784-1862: ancestry.co.uk)
He was born on 10 Mar. 1784 and baptised on11 Feb. 1785 at Ashburton, Devon, the eldest of four children of Sylvester Mann (1755-1837) and his wife Mary Giles (1757-92), who had married in 1783. Nothing is known of his education but he later stated that he had had “few educational advantages.” He went blind around 1806. He married Mary Lethbridge (1778-1851) on 17 Feb. 1813 at Ashburton. They had four sons; at least two sons were labourers but one later worked as agent for the Western Times (which sometimes promoted William Mann’s poems). He worked as a basket maker but was probably always poor. In financial need, he later republished the poems listed here in Poems on Sacred, Philanthropic, and Rural Subjects (1846), which stated that he had been blind for nearly forty years. This volume added topographical poems, an anti-slavery poem, “The African’s Advocate,” and a charming poem on “Little Miriam, or, The Ashburton Post-Woman.” In 1851 he was living in East Street, Ashburton, and listed as an almsperson and basket maker. His wife Mary died later that year, aged 73. In 1861 he was living with his son John and his family in North Street. He died on 21 Oct. 1862 and was buried on 27 Oct. at Ashburton. (ancestry.co.uk 28 Jan. 2023; findmypast.co.uk 28 Jan. 2023; Goodridge; Western Times 6 Dec. 1851, 25 Oct. 1862; Poems [1846]; West Country Poets, 320-1) AA
Other Names:
- W. Mann