Mary Agnes Tincker

Frontispiece from The Jewel in the Lotos by Thomas Hovenden 1884. Mary Agnes Tincker (July 18, 1833 – December 4, 1907) was an American novelist. She published about a dozen novels and many short stories. She was made a member of the Ancient Academy of Arcadia of Rome, and of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Philadelphia. She was educated at the high-school in Ellsworth, and at the academy in Blue Hill, Maine. At the age of thirteen she began teaching in the public schools. At fifteen her first literary work was printed. Her father was a prosperous Congregational farmer but his daughter was so shocked by an incident in which a Roman Catholic priest was tarred-and-feathered by a mob of Know-Nothing agitators, that she converted to Roman Catholicism in protest at the age of twenty.

Civil War

In 1863, she procured a recommendation from Governor John A. Andrew of Massachusetts as a volunteer nurse for the wounded of the Civil War, and served in ward 6, Judiciary Square Hospital, at Washington, D. C., until she herself fell ill. On her recovery, making her residence in Boston, she was there wholly engrossed in journalistic and literary work. Short stories from her pen appeared in the early numbers of The Catholic World. During this period she wrote her earliest novels, "The House of Yorke" and " Grapes and Thorns," both of which were in the fourth edition in 1872, and "A Winged World, and other Sketches" (1873). Much time was spent in Assisi and Palestrina. It was followed by Grapes and Thorns (1873–74) and Six Sunny Months (1876–77). The latter was the first fruit of her sojourn in Italy (1873–1887).

Rise to prominence

"Six Sunny Months" was written in Italy in 1878, and " Signor Monaldini's Niece " in 1879. The latter was published both in England and America, and immediately called forth such universal approbation from the critics and the reading world that she found herself famous overnight. The Jewel in the Lotus (1884); Aurora (1885), were all written at this time and won her great fame. and San Salvador (1889), were written after she returned to America and also sold well. By the Tiber into German by Baroness Butler, and Two Coronets, by Heusel. adapted from the work of Margaret Gatty Autumn leaves (1899)

Short stories

"Sister Sylvia" (1900) in Stories by American Authors, Scribner & Sons (short story) "From the Garden of a Friend" "Six Sunny Months, And Other Stories" (1878)