At the Circulating Library

Author: Egerton Clairmonte

Author: Egerton Clairmonte (1862–1901)

Biography: Egerton Claimonte was born on 11 February 1862 in Grahamstown, South Africa, the son of Adolphus Julian Clairmonte and his wife Catharine. The family seems to have moved to England in his youth. In 1891, he married the author Mary Chavelita Dunne who adopted the pen name George Egerton based on her husband's name. The couple lived in Ireland and had a son. Otherwise feckless, Clairmonte followed his wife's lead and wrote a novel of his own, The Africander (1896). The following year the pair separated and later divorced in 1900 after he seduced and impregnated their housemaid. He may have returned briefly to South Africa, but by 1900 he was in the southwestern United States as a miner. He died suddenly on 24 March 1901 in Los Angeles. A group of local Englishmen paid for his funeral and burial.

Author Tags:

• South African Authors
• Spouses of Novelists

References: British Census (1871); Los Angeles Herald (29 March 1901); Who's Who (1906)

Fiction Titles:

1. The Africander: A Plain Tale of Colonial Life.  1 vol.  London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1896.