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At the Circulating Library

A Database of Victorian Fiction, 1837–1901

A Database of Victorian Fiction, 1837–1901

Author: Sophie Kenrick Bevan

Author: Sophie Kenrick Bevan (1867–1941)

Alternate Name(s): Kenrick (maiden name)

Biography: Sophie Kenrick Bevan was born in 1867 in Birmingham, the eldest daugher of industrialist John Arthur Kenrick and his wife Clara (née Taylor). She came from a wealthy and well-connected family. In 1893, she married financier Gerald Lee Bevan, himself from a wealthy family connected to Barclay's bank. The couple lived lavishly in London and had seven children. Bevan wrote a novel A Think of Nought (1900) and followed it with a collection of sonnets The Vine of Life (1907). Her husband, a philanderer of some note, engaged in increasingly reckless management of his businesses which became revealed in 1922. He fled the country with his mistress, was arrested, tried, and sentenced to seven years in prison. Bevan sued for and was granted a divorce in 1923. She died on 10 January 1941 in Westholme Borth, Wales.

References: British Census (1871, 1881, 1911); Burke; Probate

Fiction Titles:

  1. A Thing of Nought.  1 vol.  London: Duckworth and Co., 1900.