Author: Gore, Catherine Grace Frances
Biography:
Gore, Catherine Grace Frances formerly Moody (1798-1861: ODNB)
She was the daughter of Charles Moody, a London wine merchant, and Mary (Brinley) Moody, but her father died at about the time of her birth and her mother soon remarried, to Charles D. Nevinson, a physician. She spent much of her childhood with her mother’s relations, including Frances, Lady Wentworth, and became accustomed to titled society. In 1823 she married Lieutenant Charles Arthur Gore; although the couple had ten children, just two survived. She had begun writing in childhood and, after her marriage, embarked on the very successful literary career that provided financially for her family. She wrote historical novels, plays, periodical pieces (including for the popular keepsake annuals), but was best known for her “silver fork” novels which were valued by her contemporaries for the accuracy of her witty and sometimes satiric depiction of high society. She enjoyed celebrity status in London, but the family also lived in Paris and Brussels, possibly for financial reasons. A substantial sum of the considerable fortune she earned through writing was lost in a bank collapse in 1855. In later life she became blind. She died at Linwood, Lyndhurst, Hampshire, and is buried in Kensal Green Cemetery. (ODNB 2 Feb. 2019)
Other Names:
- Catherine Gore
- Mrs. C. Gore
- Mrs. Charles Gore