Dibdin was from an English theatrical family. His grandfather was the dramatist, actor, and composer, Charles Dibdin (1745-1814) and his uncle, Charles Jnr [Charles Dibdin the Younger] (1768-1833) was a dramatist and manager of Sadler's Wells Theatre in London. Dibdin's father Thomas Dibdin (1771-1841) was also a dramatist and composer. Dibdin lived in Sydney, New South Wales, in the 1840s. He was employed as a prompter at the Royal Victoria Theatre in Pitt Street. Maryanne Dever suggests that Dibdin also wrote the play Humphrey Clinker, an adaption of the novel The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker by Tobias George Smollett.
Source: 'Notes on the Play' by Maryanne Dever Australasian Drama Studies no. 14, April 1989, pp. 88-89; Jon A. Gillaspie, ‘Dibdin, Charles (bap. 1745, d. 1814)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2014 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/7585, accessed 15 July 2014]; 'Royal Victoria Theatre', Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser (18 February 1841): 2; 'Adelong', The Gundagai Times and Tumut, Adelong and Murrumbidgee District Advertiser (15 August 1868): 3; 'News of the Week', The Gundagai Times and Tumut, Adelong and Murrumbidgee District Advertiser (22 August 1868): 2.
