Emma Caroline Wood

Lady Emma Caroline Wood (January 15, 1802 – December 15, 1879) was a British novelist and artist. She wrote over a dozen novels, at least one under the pen name C. Sylvester.

Emma Caroline Wood
BornJanuary 15, 1802 Edit this on Wikidata
Portugal Edit this on Wikidata
DiedDecember 15, 1879 Edit this on Wikidata (aged 77)
Belhus Edit this on Wikidata
OccupationNovelist Edit this on Wikidata
Spouse(s)John Page Wood, 2nd Baronet Edit this on Wikidata
Children13, including
Parent(s)
FamilyFrederick Thomas Michell, Charles Collier Michell Edit this on Wikidata

Life and career

Emma Caroline Mitchell was born on January 15, 1802 in Portugal.[1] She was the youngest daughter of Admiral Sampson Michell, a British Royal Navy officer who served as Commander-in-Chief of the Portuguese Navy. Initially she was raised in Lisbon, but when Napoleon invaded Portugal in 1807, Admiral Mitchell left his family in Truro, England and sailed with the Portuguese royal family to Brazil, where he died in 1809.[2][3]

In 1820, she married the Rev. John Page Wood, later 2nd Baronet. Thanks to the influence of his father, Sir Matthew Wood, 1st Baronet, Emma Wood briefly served as Lady of the Bedchamber to Queen Caroline before her death in 1821. Emma Wood would have thirteen children, including novelists Emma Barrett-Lennard and Anna Caroline Steele, Field Marshal Sir Henry Evelyn Wood VC GCB GCMG, and Katharine O'Shea, the mistress of Charles Stewart Parnell.[2]

In the 1830s, Emma Wood exhibited watercolor paintings and became a professional book illustrator. She illustrated a book of poetry, Ephemera, that she and her daughter Anna published under the names Helen and Gabrielle Carr.[2]

Lady Emma Caroline Wood's depiction of three of her daughters. L-R: Katharine O'Shea, Anna Caroline Steele, and Emma Barrett-Lennard

After Rev. Wood died in 1866, Emma Wood began publishing novels, many nautical themed. John Sutherland wrote about her Ruling the Roast (1874) that he suspected there was "an autobiographical element in the portrait of Myra Leith, the unhappy heroine...who unwisely marries the oafish clergyman son of an earl."[3]

Emma Caroline Wood died on 15 December 1879 in Belhus, Essex.[1]

Bibliography
  1. Ephemera with Anna Caroline Steele, 1856.
  2. Rosewarn: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1866.[4]
  3. Sabina: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1868.[4]
  4. Sorrow on the Sea: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Tinsley Brothers, 1868.[4]
  5. On Credit.  2 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1870.[4]
  6. Seadrift: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1871.[4]
  7. Cloth of Frieze: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1872.[4]
  8. Up Hill: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1873.[4]
  9. Wild Weather.  2 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1873.[4]
  10. Ruling the Roast: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1874.[4]
  11. Below the Salt: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1876.[4]
  12. Through Fire and Water: A Novel.  2 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1876.[4]
  13. Sheen's Foreman: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1877.[4]
  14. Youth on the Prow: A Novel.  3 vol.  London: Chapman and Hall, 1879.[4]

References
  1. Society, Index (1880). Report of the First-second Annual Meeting of the Index Society ... Index Society. p. 153.
  2. Marlow, Joyce (1975). The uncrowned queen of Ireland : the life of Kitty O'Shea. Internet Archive. New York : Saturday Review Press. pp. 4–13. ISBN 978-0-8415-0374-8.
  3. Sutherland, John (1989). The Stanford companion to Victorian fiction. Internet Archive. Stanford, Calif. : Stanford University Press. p. 678. ISBN 978-0-8047-1528-7.
  4. "Author: Emma Caroline Wood". At the Circulating Library A Database of Victorian Fiction, 1837–1901. Retrieved 2023-05-16.
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