Author: Dacre, Charlotte
Biography:
DACRE, Charlotte, formerly KING, later BYRNE (c 1781-1825: ancestry.com), pseudonym Rosa Matilda
"Dacre" was properly a pseudonym but since it is the name under which she preferred to publish and by which she became known, it is used as her "canonical name" here. For her unconventional background see the entry for her sister Sophia Fortnum (q.v.). Official records are few and the age given on her death record (53) is certainly wrong. Her parents John King and Sara Lara married in 1776. She was a legitimate child and apparently the elder sister. She herself gives her age as 23 in a note to readers in Hours of Solitude; that would indicate a birthdate of c.1782 but that year is already claimed by her sister Sophia, so we suggest c. 1781. After launching themselves as authors in 1798, the sisters enjoyed a few highly productive years. As "Rosa Matilda" Charlotte contributed poems to the newspapers, especially the Morning Post and Morning Herald, and later adopted the name Dacre for the sensational novels for which she was best known: Confessions of the Nun of St. Omer (1805), Zofloya, or The Moor (1806), The Libertine (1807), and The Passions (1811). By a liaison with the married editor of the Morning Post, Nicholas Byrne, she had three children, born in 1806, 1807, and 1809 but all baptised together in June 1811. After the death of his wife, the couple married at St. James, Piccadilly, London, on 1 Jul. 1815. She died at their home in Lancaster Place on 7 Nov. 1825 after a long illness and was buried at St. Mary's, Paddington Green, on 11 Nov. (ODNB 7 Oct. 2021: Charlotte Byrne, Sophia Fortnum, John King; Orlando; ancestry.com 7 Oct. 2021) HJ
Other Names:
- Charlotte King
- Charlotte Byrne