Smith, Seba (1792–1868)

US journalist and writer. While in Portland, Maine, he began the publication of political and satirical commentaries in the form of letters from ‘Major Downing’ 1830–33, published as The Life and Writings of Major Jack Downing of Downingsville (1833). He wrote a second series of Downing letters 1847–59, published as My Thirty Years Out of the Senate (1859).

He was born in Buckfield, Maine. He and his family moved to Bridgton, Maine (1799), and he worked in a grocery store, brick yard and iron foundry. He studied at Bowdoin (1815–18) and travelled in Europe. He became the assistant editor of the Eastern Argus, Portland, Maine 1820–26. He founded the Portland Courier in 1829. Smith moved to Charleston, South Carolina in 1839, then to New York City to work as an editor and writer. The success of Smith's Downing letters led several writers to imitate both the name and style, the most notable being Charles Augustus Davis. His Way Down East (1854), stories about typical New Englanders, was another of his popular works. In 1860 he settled in Patchogue, Long Island, New York.