Hannah Webster Foster (1758-1840)

Hannah Foster was born into a successful Massachusetts Family. Her father Grant Webster was a wealthy merchant, and when her mother Hannah Wainwright Webster passed away, he sent his young daughter to a boarding school, where she received an exemplary education.

By the 1780s, Foster was regularly contributing anonymous political pieces to Boston newspapers.

In 1785, she married Rev. John Foster, whose distant cousins were the Whitmans of Connecticat. The young couple settled in Brighton, where John Foster served as minister. It was there that Foster located both of her novels.

Based explicitly on Whitman's tale, Foster's first novel The Coquette; or, The History of Eliza Wharton, was initially printed by Samuel Etheridge at Cornhill, Boston, for local bookseller Ebenezer Larking, and the author was "A Lady of Massachusetts".

The Coquette was an immediate success: the book went through at least thirteen editions before the end of the 19th century.