Julia Catherine Beckwith (March 10, 1796 – November 28, 1867) was credited as being Canada's first novelist.

Early life

Born in

Fredericton Fredericton (; ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of New Brunswick. The city is situated in the west-central portion of the province along the Saint John River, which flows west to east as it bisects the city. The river is the do ...

New Brunswick New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...

, she spent much of her early life in

Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Eng ...

and

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirte ...

. Her mother Julie-Louise Le Brun, daughter of Jean Baptiste Le Brun de Duplessis, came from a wealthy French family who immigrated to Canada during the 17th and 18th century. Beckwith's father Nehemiah Beckwith (U. E. L.), was from

New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...

and settled in New Brunswick in 1780, where he owned a successful ship building company.Jones, Donald. "Canada's First Novel Written by a Woman : A2 Edition" Toronto Star 25 Feb. 1989: M4. Print. It was through her travels to

and

that she incorporated her experiences through her novels. Two years after Beckwith wrote her novel, her father died in a drowning accident and in 1820 and she was sent to live in

Upper Canada The Province of Upper Canada (french: link=no, province du Haut-Canada) was a Province, part of The Canadas, British Canada established in 1791 by the Kingdom of Great Britain, to govern the central third of the lands in British North Americ ...

(Kingston) with family where she would establish a boarding school for girls and meet and then marry George Henry Hart (between 1822–1824).

Career

Beckwith's mother had renounced her

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: * Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD * Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...

faith and shared her husbands

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's ...

views, yet it was her mother's religious background that would provide the subject matter of Canada's first novel ''St Ursula's Covent'' (or ''The Nun of Canada'') at the age of seventeen. It took nearly over ten years for Beckwith to find someone who would publish her work. In 1824, Hugh C. Thomson agreed to publish ''St. Ursula's Convent or, The Nun of Canada; Containing Scenes from Real Life,'' and as Beckwith wished, as an anonymous author. However, only 165 copies were made. After Beckwith's romantic novel was criticized as "too complicated", almost all copies were lost. Later, Beckwith and her husband moved to the United States where she would write her second novel ''Tonnawanda ; or, The Adopted Son of America ; an Indian Story'' and was published in Rochester, N.Y., as "By an American."Bond, Carolyn. "Vivid Views ; inal Edition The Whig-Standard 21 Sept. 1991: p1. Print. In 1831 Beckwith, along with her husband and six children, moved back to Fredericton, where she would write her third novel in manuscript ''Edith'' (or ''The Doom'') that was never published.

Later life and death

In 1831 she returned to

Fredericton, New Brunswick Fredericton (; ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of New Brunswick. The city is situated in the west-central portion of the province along the Saint John River, which flows west to east as it bisects the city. The river is the do ...

. On November 28, 1867, Julia Catherine Beckwith died in Fredericton, New Brunswick at the age of 71.

Posthumous recognition

However, she was not recognized until at the end of the century when Canadian writing became of interest. In 1904, chief librarian of the

Toronto Public Library Toronto Public Library (TPL) (french: Bibliothèque publique de Toronto) is a public library system in Toronto, Ontario. It is the largest public library system in Canada, and in 2008 had averaged a higher circulation per capita than any other pub ...

, James Bain, obtained a copy of ''St. Ursula's Convent'' at an auction for $8.00. Only five other copies have been discovered (one at the Library of Congress in Washington, the others at the Bibliothèque Nationale de Quebec, Brock University and the University of New Brunswick) and one partial copy resides at the library of McGill University.

Personal life

She married George Henry Hart in

Kingston, Ontario Kingston is a city in Ontario, Canada. It is located on the north-eastern end of Lake Ontario, at the beginning of the St. Lawrence River and at the mouth of the Cataraqui River (south end of the Rideau Canal). The city is midway between Tor ...

on January 3, 1822.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Beckwith, Julia Catherine 1796 births 1867 deaths 19th-century Canadian novelists 19th-century Canadian women writers Canadian women novelists Writers from Fredericton