Comprehensive information and links about Harriet Beecher Stowe

Harriet Beecher Stowe (June 14, 1811 – July 1, 1896) was an abolitionist and writer of more than 10 books, the most famous being which describes life in slavery, and which was first published in serial form from 1851 to 1852 in an abolitionist organ, the , another anti-slavery novel.

Born in Litchfield, Connecticut and raised primarily in Hartford, she was the daughter of Lyman Beecher, an abolitionist Congregationalist preacher from Boston and Roxana Foote Beecher, and the sister of renowned minister, Henry Ward Beecher. In 1832, her family moved to Cincinnati, another hotbed of the abolitionist movement, where her father became the first president of Lane Theological Seminary. There she gained first-hand knowledge of slavery and the Underground railroad and was moved to write , the first major American novel with an African-American hero.

In 1836 Harriet Beecher married Calvin Stowe, a clergyman and widower. Later she and her husband moved to Bowdoin College, when he obtained an academic position there. Harriet and Calvin had seven children, but some died in early childhood. Her first children, twin girls Hattie and Eliza, were born on September 29, 1836. Four years later, in 1840, her son Frederick William was born. In 1848 the birth of Samuel Charles occurred, but in the following year, he died from a cholera epidemic.

table When Stowe met Abraham Lincoln in 1862 (during the Civil War), he reportedly greeted her, "So you're the little woman who wrote the book that started this great war!"Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe Compiled From Her Letters and Journals by Her Son Charles Edward Stowe