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At the Circulating Library

A Database of Victorian Fiction, 1837–1901

A Database of Victorian Fiction, 1837–1901

Author: Emma Hosken Woodward

Author: Emma Hosken Woodward (1845–1884)

Alternate Name(s): Hosken (maiden name)

Biography: Emma Hosken Woodward was born in 1845 in Penryn, Cornwall, the daughter of Richard Hosken and Emily Nettle. In 1865, she married a distant cousin Thomas Butterfill Hosken. The couple lived in Llandefaelog Fach, Wales, where her husband was the rector and they had three children. Her infant son and husband died of diphtheria in 1869 and 1870 respectively. Thereafter, she and her two daughters returned to Penryn to live with her mother. As a widow, Woodward wrote two anonymous novels: Married for Money (1875) and Bitter to Sweet End (1877). In 1881, she was a visitor at the Sisters of Mercy in Holborn. The following year she married Bernard Barham Woodward (1854–1930), an assistant librarian at the British Museum. The marriage was short lived since Emma died in July 1884. After her death, her husband published her last work, Men, Women, and Progress (1885), a political discussion of the woman question.

Author Tags:

References: British Census (1871, 1881); pers inf (Sue Etherington); Probate

Fiction Titles:

  1. Married for Money.  1 vol.  London: Samuel Tinsley, 1875.
  2. Bitter to Sweet End: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Samuel Tinsley, 1877.