Sewell, Anna (1820-1878)

English writer. Her only published work, the novel Black Beauty (1877), tells the life story of a horse. It was a best-seller and became a children's classic.

She was born in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, into a Quaker family. Her aim in writing the book was ‘to induce kindness, sympathy, and understanding treatment of horses’. Her mother Mary (Wright) Sewell (1797-1884) was also an author; her sentimental ballad ‘A Mother's Last Words’ (1860) was said to have sold 1 million copies.