George Edward Biber
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George Edward Biber (born Georg Eduard Biber; 4 September 1801 – 19 January 1874) was a German writer who migrated to the United Kingdom, where he became a man of letters and Anglican priest.
Biber was born in 1801 at Ludwigsburg, Duchy of Württemberg, to Johann Gottlieb Biber and Anna Maria Gugel. After studying at the Lyceum there, where his father was then professor, he entered the university of Tübingen. He took there the degree of Ph.D., and subsequently received an LL.D. at the university of Göttingen.[1]
For political reasons, Biber left Württemberg, first for Italy, and then for the Grisons, where for several months he lay low in a farmhouse. He then to Yverdun, where he became a master in one of the institutions set up by Heinrich Pestalozzi. In 1826 he accepted the offer of a tutorship in England. He became the head of a classical school at Hampstead, and later at Coombe Wood.[1]
On his arrival in England Biber lacked religious convictions, but joined the Church of England. Naturalised by act of parliament, he was ordained to the curacy of Ham, London in July 1839. In 1842 he was appointed to the new vicarage of Holy Trinity, Roehampton, and ministered there for 30 years. He opposed the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland, and took part the establishment of the National Club founded in 1845 by John Campbell Colquhoun; it was a pressure group for Anglicans and other Protestants. He was also a founder of the Metropolitan Church Union in 1849, and in 1850 of the Society for the Revival of Convocation.[1][2]
Biber was elected a member of the council of the English Church Union in 1863, and was prominent in the case of J. W. Colenso. He resigned his seat in June 1864, finding unacceptable some of his liberal and Anglo-Catholic colleagues.[1]
One of the main writers in the English Review, Biber also contributed to the Churchman's Magazine, the Literary Churchman, the Church Review, the Colonial Church Chronicles and to the English Churchman. He edited John Bull, another periodical for which he wrote, from 1848 to 1856.[1]
In later life, Biber lived for periods in Brighton.[3] Early in 1872 he was promoted by Lord Chancellor Hatherley to the rectory of West Allington, near Grantham. He died there in 1874.[1]
