android - do you ever have to add fragments to the manifest

No don't add it to your manifest. You never need to add fragments to your manifest.

Do you create an Intent somewhere to start the WebActivity? How is it brought to the screen, that is probably where your problem lies.

EDIT

This is your problem:

 Intent showContent = new Intent(getApplicationContext(),
            WebFrag.class);
 startActivity(showContent);

You can't start a Fragment as an Activity, you'll have to wrap the fragment in an Activity that extends FragmentActivity