Hesba Stretton

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HS was a prolific writer, who during the later nineteenth century produced nearly sixty works of fiction for children and adults, several works of non-fiction, and numerous contributions to a variety of different periodicals. Renowned for her bestselling evangelical children's stories, she typically chose to write about social reform in a style that has been described as pathetic simplicity.
Black and white photograph of Hesba Stretton, seated, with her arm resting on the ornately tasseled arm of her chair. She is plainly dressed in a floor-length dark dress, with buttons up the front and long puff sleeves. Her dark hair is parted in the centre and pulled back tightly; her gaze is straight ahead.

Milestones

27 July 1832

Sarah Smith (later HS ) was born in New Street, Wellington, Shropshire.
Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder.
Khorana, Meena, and Judith Gero John, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 163. Gale Research.
163: 288

19 March 1859

HS 's first publication (under her birth name of Sarah Smith) was the short story The Lucky Leg in Charles Dickens 's Household Words.
It has been generally said that HS 's sister Elizabeth secretly sent the story to Dickens , who paid £5 and requested more contributions.
Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder.
The Dictionary of Literary Biography, however, claims that recent research has disposed of the well-worn anecdote.
Khorana, Meena, and Judith Gero John, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 163. Gale Research.
163: 288
Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder.

July 1866

HS 's phenomenally bestselling and most beloved work of children's fiction, Jessica's First Prayer, was first published in Sunday at Home.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Khorana, Meena, and Judith Gero John, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 163. Gale Research.
163: 288

1906

HS (the pseudonym which Sarah Smith had used throughout her writing career and in quotidian life) published an anthology which was her last work, Thoughts on Old Age: Good Words from Many Minds.
Kelly, Gary, and Edd Applegate, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 190. Gale Research.
190: 311

8 October 1911

HS died at her house, Ivy Croft, in Ham, Surrey, after four years of unidentified illness.
Sources disagree as to whether her sister and lifelong companion Elizabeth died eight months before HS or within months afterwards. Patricia Demers in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography says that Elizabeth predeceased Hesba.
Kelly, Gary, and Edd Applegate, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 190. Gale Research.
190: 315
Commire, Anne, and Deborah Klezmer, editors. Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia. Yorkin Publications.
Khorana, Meena, and Judith Gero John, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 163. Gale Research.
163: 290
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder.
Khorana, Meena, and Judith Gero John, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 163. Gale Research.
163: 290

Biography

Sarah Smith adopted the pseudonym Hesba Stretton in 1858, when she found her own name too dull; she made her first name up from the first initials of her then living siblings, and took her last name from All Stretton, a village in Shropshire.
Stephen, Sir Leslie, and Sidney Lee, editors. The Dictionary of National Biography. Smith, Elder.
Khorana, Meena, and Judith Gero John, editors. Dictionary of Literary Biography 163. Gale Research.
163: 288

Birth and Family

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