Article

James Bagnall

Published Online January 16, 2008

Last Edited December 15, 2013

James Bagnall, printer, publisher, politician, officeholder (b at Shelburne, NS 1783; d at Bedeque, PEI 20 June 1855). The son of New York LOYALISTS, he moved with his parents to Charlottetown as an infant.

Bagnall, James

James Bagnall, printer, publisher, politician, officeholder (b at Shelburne, NS 1783; d at Bedeque, PEI 20 June 1855). The son of New York LOYALISTS, he moved with his parents to Charlottetown as an infant. Despite limited formal education, he published several early newspapers in PEI and NS between 1805 and 1828 after apprenticing with a brother-in-law in Virginia and the District of Columbia. He also published the Island's first almanac (1815) and, as king's printer, produced the first printed Journal of the local assembly (1805) since 1797, and the first printed volume of PEI laws (1817) since 1789.

Elected to the Island assembly more than once, he was associated with the Loyal Electors, a group at odds with the local elite and sometimes described as the first political society in what is now Canada.