Johann Georg II WEBBER was born on 18 Oct 1741 in Germany. He died
prob. btwn 1811-1820 in Nova Scotia. Johann Georg Weber (known as George
Webber in North America, sometimes recorded as Weaver) was, per family
tradition, born 18 Oct 1741 in Germany, but on the January 1765 passenger
lists to South Carolina, he is given as age 25 years, making his date of
birth 1739. He was the eldest son of Johann George Weber (born around 1712)
and Catarina ?? (born around 1718), who also emigrated to South Carolina
with George's surviving siblings (Frederick @20 years old, Susanna @19
years old, Barbara @16 years old and Heinrich @11 years old).
He married (1) Barbara ?? in Germany, and she came to South Carolina with
him, being age 23 years in December 1764. He married (2) Elizabeth ??.
On Capt. William Shaw's 2 June 1784 muster list of Loyalist settlers at
Ship Harbour, the wife of John George Webber is given as Elizabeth. She
lived until after 1800 and her name appears on a land deed dated 1 Aug
1800.
In 1763, Johann Heinrich Christian von Stumpell, a Hanoverian officer in
the Prussian army, began negotiating with the British government for a
grant of land in Nova Scotia on which to settle Protestant, primarily German,
immigrants. In the summer of 1764, he began to recruit families in the
Rheinland to settle on this land, yet to be obtained from the British Crown.
Some 400 German families, including the Johann George Weber family, arrived
in London expecting to move on to Nova Scotia.
Von Stumpell, having taken from these families their passage money and
valuables "for protection," then absconded, leaving the Germans
penniless on the docks of London. The British Crown, on hearing of their
plight, suggested, reflecting a shift on colonial policy, that they be
given land in South Carolina instead of Nova Scotia, and a bounty was paid
for their passage there.
The Webber family arrived in Charleston, South Carolina on 16 December
1764, probably on the Union, and they took the oath of allegiance on 26
February 1765 at Charleston.
On 23 Aug 1765 George Webber Jr. was granted 200 acres of land (the allotment
for a man with wife and one child over age 2 years) on Cuffytown Creek,
near his father's 350-acre grant in District 96, the rugged South Carolina
backlands.
The younger Webber couple are said to have had twelve children, of whom
only six survived to accompany the family to Nova Scotia.
During the Revolutionary War, the younger George Webber and his elder sons
served in Capt. Thomas Pearson's Regiment of the Little River Militia,
96 Brigade, in the same company as Lawrence Marks, later to be another
Ship Harbour Loyalist settler.
The Webber family withdrew from District 96 to Charleston with the British
forces in the summer of 1781 and evacuated with the British from Charleston
to Halifax in late 1782, arriving at Halifax on the Royal Navy troopship
Argo on 21 Nov 1782.
The Webber family spent the winter of 1782-83 at Halifax in tents, and
moved out with other Loyalist and military settlers to Ship Harbour in
May 1783. As a part of the ad hoc Associated Loyalists of South Carolina,
he was given former permission in June 1783 by the governor of Nova Scotia
to settle at Ship Harbour. He was on a 21 Aug 1783 list of settlers at
Ship Harbour who were to be victualled over the winter from government
stocks. Charles Morris surveyed lots at Ship Harbour for this group on
13 March 1784, in which George Webber was assigned Lot #8, some 200 acres
on the western side of Ship Harbour, and he received title to this land
as a part of a grant made to Capt. Thomas Green. The Webber family was
included on Capt. William Shaw's 2 June 1784 muster list of Loyalist refugees
then at Ship Harbour.
In July 1786, he filed a claim to the Loyalist Claims Commission for £471
in compensation for property left behind in South Carolina. Of this sum,
£130 was allowed by the commission, but he was actually paid only £52 in
compensation.
The schooner Friendship of Ship Harbour, sailing under "Capt. Weaver",
was reported cleared to leave Halifax on 24 Nov 1789, an indication of
some of George Webber's economic activity at Ship Harbour.
On 5 Oct 1790, he purchased 200 acres of land on the east side of Ship
Harbour, which he sold to Thomas Merryweather on 1 Aug 1800. He purchased
on 30 Aug 1811 from Thomas Stoddard the 2,000-acre grant at Clam Bay that
had been made on 13 July 1765 to Duncan, Robert Jr. and Robert Campbell,
and which had been share-cropped by John Frederick Rupert until its sale
on 8 Aug 1799 to Thomas Stoddard. The Campbell title to this land eventually
proved to be defective, however, and so George Webber had to ask the Crown
to grant him 500 acres of the same land he thought he had purchased. This
grant was given him, and this marked the permanent establishment of the
Webber family at Clam Bay on the farmstead known as "Birch Hill".
George Webber's death was not recorded in comtemporary records, and most
likely occurred at Clam Bay in the second decade of the 19th century. He
was not included on Daniel Sutherland's Jan 1820 list of inhabitants of
Clam Harbour, nor enumerated in the 1827 census.
(Many thanks to Robert Kim Stevens for the above biography.) Parents: Johann
Georg WEBBER and Catarina.
He was married to Mary
Elizabeth DOULL? in Germany. Children were: Johann
Georg III WEBBER, George
Henry WEBBER, Peter
John WEBBER, Philip
James WEBBER, Catherine
Elizabeth WEBBER , Samuel
Frederick WEBBER, 6
other children WEBBER.
He was married to Barbara?
.
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