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Anna Hanson Dorsey (1815 – 26 December 1896) was an American author of novels and short stories. A convert to Catholicism, she was a pioneer of Catholic literature in the United States.

Anna Hanson Dorsey
Born	1815
Died	December 26, 1896(1896-12-26) (aged 80–81) Washington, D.C.
Occupation	Writer
Nationality	American
Genre	Novels, Short Stories
Notable awards	Laetare Medal
Spouse	Lorenzo Dorsey

Family

Born Anna Hanson in Georgetown, Washington, D.C., she was the daughter of the Rev. William McKenney, a chaplain in the U.S. Navy, and Chloe Ann Lanigan McKenney.[1] In 1837 she married Lorenzo Dorsey, a Baltimore judge.[2] Their only son died fighting on the Union side in the American Civil War.[1] Her daughter, Ella Loraine Dorsey, was an author.[3]

Writing career

Dorsey converted to Catholicism in 1840 and thereafter devoted herself to Catholic literature, mainly in the form of stories and novels, although she wrote a small amount of poetry as well.[1] Her more than 40 novels frequently centered on a religious conversion narrative aimed at her largely Protestant audiences, and her New York Times obituary referred to her as a pioneer of Catholic literature in the United States.[2] Her plots tended towards melodrama, with elements such as mistaken identities, mysterious disappearances, and false accusations.[2] Her novel Coaina: The Rose of the Algonquins was translated into both German and Hindustani and also made into a stage play.[1] At least two of her novels — The Student of Blenheim Forest (1847) and The Sister of Charity (1850) — were still in print at the end of the century.[2]

Pope Leo XIII twice sent her his benediction, and the University of Notre Dame conferred upon her the Laetare Medal.[4]

She died in Washington, D.C.

Selected works

References

Attribution

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Anna Hanson Dorsey". Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.

Bibliography

• James Emmett Ryan (15 March 2013). Faithful Passages: American Catholicism in Literary Culture, 1844–1931. University of Wisconsin Pres. ISBN 978-0-299-29063-4.

Further reading

• Thorp, Willard. "Catholic Novelists in Defense of Their Faith, 1829–1865". Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society 78, pt. 1 (1968), pp. 25–117.

External links

• Works by Anna Hanson Dorsey at Project Gutenberg

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