Elizabeth Gaskell

Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell, , often referred to as Mrs Gaskell, was an English novelist and short story writer during the Victorian era. Her novels offer a detailed portrait of the lives of many strata of society, including the very poor, and are of interest to social historians as well as lovers of literature. Her first novel, Mary Barton, was published in 1848. Gaskells The Life of Charlotte Bront, published in 1857, was the first biography about Bront. Some of Gaskells best known novels are Cranford , North and South , and Wives and Daughters .

Gaskell was born Elizabeth Cleghorn Stevenson onSeptember 1810 at 93 Cheyne Walk, Chelsea. She was the youngest of eight children only she and her brother John survived infancy. Her father, William Stevenson, was a Scottish Unitarian minister at Failsworth, Lancashire, but resigned his orders on conscientious grounds and moved to London in 1806 with the intention of going to India after he was appointed private secretary to the Earl of Lauderdale, who was to become Governor General of India. That position did not materialise, however, and instead Stevenson was nominated Keeper of the Treasury Records. His wife, Elizabeth Holland, came from a family from the English Midlands that was connected with other prominent Unitarian families, including the Wedgwoods, the Martineaus, the Turners and the Darwins. When she died 13160months after giving birth to her youngest daughter, she left a bewildered husband who saw no alternative for Elizabeth but to be sent to live with her mothers siste

Source: Wikipedia