Charlotte O'Conor Eccles

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COCE succeeded in earning a living as a journalist in Dublin (in the 1880s) and London (1890s and early twentieth century). She published books on social and political matters, household management, and male conduct, as well as two novels, a translated novel, and a volume of stories. She died young. She is best remembered for her vivid account of her struggles to break into the male stronghold of Fleet Street.
  • BirthName: Charlotte O'Conor Eccles
  • Self-constructed: C. O'Conor-Eccles
  • Pseudonyms: A Modern Maid; Hal Godfrey; The Author of the Rejuvenation of Miss Semaphore

Milestones

1 November 1863

COCE was born at Roscommon in Ireland. She was the fourth daughter in her family, but the elder of the only two children who lived to grow up.
“Charlotte OConor EcclesRoscommon Historical Research.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

June 1893

Blackwood's Magazine carried COCE 's The Experience of a Woman Journalist, a hard-hitting account of the immense difficulty a woman finds in getting into an office in any recognised capacity, especially in newspapers.
qtd. in
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.

1897

COCE chose the pseudonym Hal Godfrey for her first and best-known novel, The Rejuvenation of Miss Semaphore.
“The Times Digital Archive 1785-2007”. Thompson Gale: The Times Digital Archive.
39612 (15 June 1911): 11
OCLC WorldCat. 1992–1998, http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.

September 1906

COCE published her second and final novel, The Matrimonial Lottery, with Eveleigh Nash , under her actual name.
O’Conor Eccles, Charlotte. The Matrimonial Lottery. Eveleigh Nash, 1906, 299 pp.
closing pages
OCLC WorldCat. 1992–1998, http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.

14 June 1911

COCE died of cerebral thrombosis at her home in Alexandra Road, St John's Wood, London.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

Biography

Birth and Family

1 November 1863

COCE was born at Roscommon in Ireland. She was the fourth daughter in her family, but the elder of the only two children who lived to grow up.
“Charlotte OConor EcclesRoscommon Historical Research.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

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