Harriet Beecher Stowe
By Erinne Butler
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Harriet Elisabeth Beecher
Born: June 14, 1811 (Litchfield, Connecticut)
Died: July 1, 1896 (Hartford, Connecticut)
Daughter to: Lyman and Roxana Beecher
Sisters: Catharine, Mary and half-sister Isabella
Brothers: William, Edward, George, Henry Ward,
Charles and half-brothers Thomas and James
Early Years
• Harriet was the seventh and youngest child of
Lyman and Roxana
• Her name was given to her in honor of her aunt
Harriet Foote, who deeply influenced her
thinking, especially about culture.
• Her uncle Samuel Foote encouraged her to read
the works of Lord Byron and Sir Walter Scott
• At the age of forty-one Roxana died of
tuberculosis , at the time Harriet was just four
• Two years later a step-mother assumed the role
of mother in the household
Education and Career Beginning
• When Harriet was eleven she was sent to the
seminary, or a private school for young women, that
was kept by her older sister Catharine in Hartford,
Connecticut
• There she learned advanced curriculums of
languages, natural and mechanical sciences, ethics,
mathematics and other subjects generally only
taught to young men
• Four years later she was employed as an assistant
teacher
• Together she and Catharine founded the Western
Female Institute and began her writing career by
writing a children’s geography book with her sister
Her Family
• She married to Calvin Ellis Stowe, professor at
her father’s theological seminary and a widower
to her friend, in 1836
• The first fourteen years of marriage were
spent in poverty, and during that time they had
seven children
• Then in 1850 Calvin was offered a
professorship at Bowdoin therefore moving to
Maine in the process.
• Calvin Stowe died 1886 and Harriet’s mental
faculties failed two years later in 1888 and
then she died in 1896 at the age of eightyfive.
Some of Her Works of Literature
• Her first book was The Mayflower which she
published in 1843
• She became a frequent writer to the Western
Monthly Magazine after she won a prize
contest in 1834
• Lady Byrin vindicated (1870) was the novel in
which she accuses Lord Byron of having
incestuous relations with his half-sister. Doing
so she suffered greatly after the British
opinion turned against her.
• Her last novel was Poganuc people in 1878,
which partly reminiscences on her husbands
childhood
Uncle Tom’s Cabin
• She was inspired to write her most famous novel
after she had come into contact with fugitive
slaves during her time in Cincinnati, learned about
how cruel life in the South was and how the
slaves were treated. Also she had noticed the
Fugitive Slave Law, which stated that it was
illegal to house escapes slaves
• Finally, after the death of her infant son Samuel
to Cholera she wrote one of the most famous
pieces of literature in the 19th century in 18511852
Uncle tom’s Cabin continued…
• It was first published in the anti-slavery newspaper
The National Era from June 1851 to April 1852
• Then later on it was published in book form
• The book itself was based on the true life and times
of Josiah Henson
• The book was smuggled into Russia in Yiddish so it
would pass through censors unnoticed.
• The play was translated into thirty-seven languages
and sold five and a half million copies
• After the civil war the sales of the story declined
• Its first film adaptation was made in 1903 and in
1970 the novel’s strong female characters attracted
female critic but Tom’s passivity gained no defenders
Bibliography
• Women in History. Harriet Beecher Stowe biography.
Last Updated: 3/9/2010. Lakewood Public Library.
Date accessed 4/29/2010 .
<http://www.lkwdpl.org/wihohio/stow-har.htm>.
• Liukkonen, Petri. "Harriet Beecher-Stowe."
www.kirjasto.sci.fi. 2008. Web. 02 May 2010.
<http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/hbstowe.htm>.