Mary Webb

Mary Espartero Webb (1828 – June 17, 1859) was an American actress and orator known for her dramatic readings of poetry and literature. She toured the northern United States and performed in Europe as a protégée of Harriet Beecher Stowe.

Early life and family Mary E. Webb was born in New Bedford, Massachusetts, three weeks after her mother succeeded in escaping there from slavery in Virginia. Laura Korobkin interprets Dickens's dismissal of Webb, an educated African American woman, as evidence of racial and social anxiety regarding his own status.

In the wake of the Webbs' visit to England, the London firm of G. Routledge and Company published Frank Webb's first and only novel, The Garies and Their Friends, which was published with a preface by Stowe.