William Baylebridge

Who was William Baylebridge?

William Baylebridge was the pseudonym of Charles William Blocksidge, an Australian poet and short-story writer.

Blocksidge was born in Brisbane, Queensland, the son of George Henry Blocksidge, an auctioneer and estate agent. He was educated at Brisbane Grammar School and by a private tutor David Owen, M.A., a classical scholar who became a close friend.

In 1908 Blocksidge travelled to London with his friend Robert Graham Brown. He travelled the Continent and published ten books including two of prose, beginning with Songs of the South, which was followed a year later by Australia to England and other Verses. Both of these books were suppressed shortly after their publication. In 1910 no fewer than four volumes were privately printed, Moreton Miles, Southern Songs, A Northern Trail, and The New Life, of which copies were sent to the principal public libraries, but few, if any, were sold to the public. There was no publisher's name on any of the volumes, and nothing to suggest where they had been printed.