1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Strickland, Agnes

STRICKLAND, AGNES (1806–1874), English historical writer, was born in 1806, the third daughter of Thomas Strickland, of Reydon Hall, Suffolk. Her first literary efforts were historical romances in verse in the style of Walter Scott—Worcester Field (published without date), Demetrius and other Poems (1833). From this she passed to prose histories, written in a simple style for the young. A picturesque sketch of the Pilgrims of Walsingham appeared in 1835, two volumes of Tales and Stories from History in the following year. Then, with the assistance of her sister, she projected a more ambitious work, The Lives of the Queens of England, from Matilda of Flanders to Queen Anne. The first volume appeared in 1840, the twelfth and last in 1849. Miss Strickland was a warm partisan on the side of royalty and the church, but she made industrious study of " official records and other public documents," gave copious extracts from them, and drew interesting pictures of manners and customs. While engaged on this work she found time in 1843 to edit the Letters of Mary, Queen of Scots, whose innocence she championed with enthusiasm. In 1850 she followed up her Queens of England with the Lives of the Queens of Scotland, completing the series in eight volumes in 1859. Unresting in her industry, she turned next to the Bachelor Kings of England, about whom she published a volume in 1861. The Lives of the Seven Bishops followed in 1866—after a longer interval, part of which was employed in producing an abridged version of her Queens of England. Her last work was the Lives of the Last Four Stuart Princesses, published in 1872. In 1871 she obtained a civil-list pension of £100 in recognition of her merits. She died on the 8th of July 1874.

A Life by her sister, Jane Margaret Strickland, appeared in 1887.