HANNAH MORE - AUTOGRAPH NOTE SIGNED CIRCA 1822 - HFSID 73383

HANNAH MORE
The 18th-century writer and philanthropist comments on the popularity of famed portrait painter Henry William Pickersgill in letter to friend, signs name in black ink
Autograph note signed: "H. More" in faded black ink. 1 page, 5x2½. Addressed to Mrs. Cookson. In full: "Mr. Cookson will be glad to hear that our friend Pickersgill is rising very fast in eminence and reputation". Henry William Pickersgill was one of the most notable portrait figures of his time, even painting More's portrait in 1822. Hannah More (1745-1833) was an English religious writer and philanthropist; her career is said to consist of three reputations, a poet and playwright in the Blue Stocking Society crowd of Dr. Samuel Johnson, Joshua Reynolds, and David Garrick, a writer of religious and moral subjects, and as a practical philanthropist. More, alongside her father and sisters, opened a boarding school when she was in her teens, and she taught there as a young women. After More suffered a heartbreaking end to an engagement, she focused on her literary career, staging the play The Inflexible Captive (1774) before her most successful work Percy: a Tradgedy in 1777, eventually quitting playwriting after the failure of her last work The Fatal Falsehood (1779). In the 1790s More became involved with a group of evangelical Christians known as the Clapham Sect, who were firm opposes to slavery, and More began writing and editing religious tracts (ballads, moral stories, and readings), composing such works as "Slavery, A Poem" (1788). More, furthermore, worked alongside her sister Martha More to campaign for the education of the poor, even opening more than a dozen Sunday schools. Normal mailing folds. Irregularly cut. Toned. Edges worn and frayed. Creased throughout. Ink spots throughout. Otherwise, fine condition.