Mary Martha Sherwood

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Standard Name: Sherwood, Mary Martha
Birth Name: Mary Martha Butt
Married Name: Mary Martha Sherwood
Indexed Name: Mrs Sherwood
Pseudonym: A Young Lady
Pseudonym: The Author of The Traditions
MMSwrote and signed more than 350 books (mostly for children, but including several adult novels), and left almost a score of fat volumes of diary. Some of her children's books, despite their uncompromisingly hell-fire message, remained current for several generations and were vividly remembered by many impressionable children, some of whom grew up to be writers. Her former high repute as a children's writer is at least as well deserved for her autobiography and diary, and her biographer Naomi Royde-Smith seriously admired some of her novels.
Royde-Smith, Naomi, and Denis Dighton. The State of Mind of Mrs. Sherwood. Macmillan, 1946.
1
She also wrote poems. The British Library lacks many of her books; the holdings of Cambridge University Library and the Bodleian are better.
Head-and-shoulders print of Mary Martha Sherwood in profile by M. Maskall. She rests her head on a hand. Only her face and her frilled and ribboned cap are rendered in detail.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Education Elizabeth Taylor
Her first school, where she went at the age of six, was a little private establishment called Leopold House, which gave a grounding in English and maths and team games.
Beauman, Nicola. The Other Elizabeth Taylor. Persephone Books, 2009.
12-13
When Betty was eleven...
Education Mary Russell Mitford
She spent several years at the boarding school at 22 Hans Place in Chelsea, run by Monsieur de St Quintin or St Quentin (who bailed her father out with money in some of his...
Education Carola Oman
The children's great delight was their mother reading aloud: theLamb s' Tales from Shakespeare, Sir Walter Scott 's poems, William Edmonstoune Aytoun 's Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers, 1865, Mary Martha Sherwood
Education Winifred Peck
From their nurse and the books read aloud by their governess rather than from their parents, the Knox children's religious education tended in the direction of bigotry, as mentioned above.
Peck, Winifred. A Little Learning; or, A Victorian Childhood. Faber and Faber, 1952.
26-9
Their parents encouraged them...
Education Annie Keary
Annie was an eager reader, and in a comparative dearth of children's books she read the educationalist Rollin and the ancient historian Plutarch at an early age.
It is probably Charles Rollin who is meant...
Education Rudyard Kipling
Even during the years of the detested Southsea school RK was developing an appreciation for literature. He writes of being surprised when reading (something Mrs Holloway forced him to do under threat of punishment) turned...
Education Ann Bridge
As a small child she stood out among the family for her quite exceptional naughtiness, which in later years she put down to surplus energy and dramatic ideas.
Bridge, Ann. A Family of Two Worlds. Macmillan, 1955.
141
When she began regular lessons, and...
Education Frances Browne
FB 's blindness meant that she did not have a formal education, and she very early felt the want of it.
Browne, Frances. The Star of Attéghéi; the Vision of Schwartz; and Other Poems. Edward Moxon, 1844.
ix
From the age of seven, when she heard a sermon she did not...
Family and Intimate relationships Mary Butts
His forebears had strong links with the artistic world. While he himself was a friend of the Pre-Raphaelite artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti , Mary's great-grandfather, Captain Thomas Butts , had been a patron of William Blake
Friends, Associates Hannah More
Many of her later friends were at least a generation younger than she was. She met many members of the Clapham Sect in the 1790s, of whom Henry Thornton and his daughter Marianne became particularly...
Friends, Associates Frances Arabella Rowden
FAR was visited in Paris in 1820 by her old schoolfellow Mary Martha Sherwood .
Darton, F. J. Harvey, editor. The Life and Times of Mrs. Sherwood. Wells Gardner, Darton, 1910.
450
By this date they had in common their intensely Evangelical belief.
Friends, Associates Mary Anne Schimmelpenninck
She knew other distinguished writers from the previous generation too, and her friends both before and after her marriage included many in the world of literature. A couple of years after this she spent the...
Intertextuality and Influence Eliza Meteyard
This illustrated story of a young girl's childhood and education has some autobiographical elements (Howitt calls it her own early life),
Lee, Amice. Laurels & Rosemary: The Life of William and Mary Howitt. Oxford University Press, 1955.
188
including the profession of the army surgeon father of the eponymous character...
Intertextuality and Influence Maria Callcott
MC told her friend Caroline Fox that she would write this book from memory without consulting sources. It may be relevant to her choice of title that Mary Martha Sherwood had published a children's book...
Intertextuality and Influence Charlotte Maria Tucker
As before, in 1857, she was influenced by the eighteenth-century writer Mary Martha Sherwood , who had introduced Indian settings to children's literature.
Bratton, Jacqueline S. The Impact of Victorian Children’s Fiction. Croom Helm, 1981.
78
Cutt, Margaret Nancy. Ministering Angels: A Study of Nineteenth-Century Evangelical Writing for Children. Five Owls Press, 1979.
81-2

Timeline

By May 1619
The Calvinist Synod of Dort in Holland confirmed the doctrine of total human depravity, setting it at the head of their articles of doctrine.
About 1766
Printer and engraver John Spilsbury perfected the dissected map which became the forerunner of the jigsaw puzzle.

Texts

Sherwood, Mary Martha, and George Baxter. Caroline Mordaunt. William Darton, 1835.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. Emancipation. Houlston, 1829.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. Little Henry and His Bearer. F. Houlston and Son, 1814.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. Margarita. Minerva Press, 1799.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. Roxobel. Houlston, 1831.
Sherwood, Mary Martha, and Sophia Kelly. The Golden Garland of Inestimable Delights. J. Hatchard, 1849.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The Governess. F. Houlston, 1820.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The History of George Desmond. F. Houlston and Son, 1821.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The History of Little George and His Penny. F. Houlston and Son, 1816.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The History of Susan Gray. Samuel Hazard, 1802.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The History of the Fairchild Family. J. Hatchard, 1847.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The Indian Pilgrim. Houlston, 1818.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The Infant’s Progress. F. Houlston and Son, 1821.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The Lady of the Manor. F. Houlston, 1823.
Sherwood, Mary Martha, and Henry Sherwood. The Life of Mrs. Sherwood. Editor Kelly, Sophia, Darton, 1854.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The Monk. Ward and Lock, 1830.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The Nun. R. B. Seeley and Burnside, and L. B. Seeley and Sons, 1833.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The Re-Captured Negro. F. Houlston, 1821.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. The Traditions. Minerva Press, 1795.
Sherwood, Mary Martha. Victoria. J. Hatchard and Son, 1833.