Mary Roberts (author)


Mary Roberts was an English author who predominantly wrote about natural history and the countryside around her.

Life

Roberts, born at Homerton, London, on 18 March 1788, was the daughter of Daniel Roberts, a merchant of London, and Ann, his wife. Ann Roberts was the daughter of Josiah Thompson, of Nether Compton, Dorset; her grandfather was the quaker botanist, Thomas Lawson, and her paternal great-great-grandfather was Daniel Roberts.
Little is known about her early life, although it is known that in 1790 Mary Roberts moved with her parents to Painswick in Gloucestershire where she began writing her works on natural history.
Although born and brought up a quaker, Mary Roberts left the society after the death of her father, when she moved with her mother to Brompton Square, London. Mary Roberts died there on 13 January 1864, and was buried in Brompton cemetery.
Some confusion has arisen between Miss Roberts and a cousin of the same name, Mary Roberts, daughter of Samuel Roberts of Sheffield, author of Royal Exile, 1822.

Publications

Mary Roberts wrote fifteen books, most about natural history. Some passages in her Annals of my Village, Being a Calendar of Nature for Every Month in the Year, fall little short of the descriptive power of Richard Jefferies.

Natural history

Mary Roberts also edited several books;