Author: Weller, Catharine
Biography:
WELLER, Catharine (fl 1810-18)
"Catharine Weller" was not an uncommon name in the northeastern US at the end of the eighteenth century, particularly within the ranks of the Dutch Reformed churches, and the author of The Medley cannot be identified with perfect certainty. However, given the content of her volume--verse and prose of an improving, do-gooding character--and the place of publication, it seems very likely that she was born in 1771 in Montgomery, Orange County NY, the daughter of Heronymus and Elsje (Buchstaber) Weller. An advertisement for her book in 1810 notes that it was for sale at the store of Hiram Weller of nearby Newburgh NY. Perhaps about this time, she moved north to Kingston NY where her name is on record as the Secretary of the Female Bible Society (1814) and later as one of the founders of a Female Auxiliary to the Foreign Missionary Society (1818) in which the Dutch Reformed Church was a participant. No reliable information has been found about her later life. (ancestry.com 16 Jan. 2021; Orange County Patriot [Goshen NY] 12 Dec. 1810; Christian Herald 1 [1814] 189; Weekly Recorder [Chillicothe OH] 17 Jul. 1818) HJ