Margaret Mary Julia Devlin (née Ashford; 3 April 1881 – 15 January 1972), known as Daisy Ashford, was an English writer who is most famous for writing The Young Visiters, a novella concerning the upper class society of late-19th-century England, when she was nine years old.

Life

Early life and education

thumb|Daisy Ashford as a child

Daisy Ashford was born on 3 April 1881 in Petersham, Surrey, the eldest of three daughters born to Emma Georgina Walker and William Henry Roxburgh Ashford. She was largely educated at home with her sisters Maria Veronica 'Vera' (born 1882) and Angela Mary 'Angie' (born 1884).

Career

At the age of four Daisy dictated her first story, The Life of Father McSwiney, to her father; it was published in 1983. From 1889 to 1896 she and her family lived at 44 St Anne's Crescent, Lewes, where she wrote The Young Visiters. She wrote several other stories; a play, A Woman's Crime; and one other short novel, The Hangman's Daughter, which she considered to be her best work. Some stories written by Ashford are lost.

She stopped writing during her teens. In 1896 the family moved to the Wallands area of Lewes, She did not write in later years, although in old age she did begin an autobiography which she later destroyed.

Personal life

In 1920, at the age of 38, Ashford married James Devlin with whom she had four children. They ran a flower-growing business near Norwich and later the King's Arms Hotel in Reepham for a year. Devlin died in 1956.

Death

She died on 15 January 1972 in Norwich, England, and was buried at Earlham Road Cemetery there.

Mathew Klickstein and Rick Geary's graphic novel Daisy Goes to the Moon: A Daisy Ashford Adventure was published by Fantagraphics in January 2025.

Published writings

  • The Young Visiters, or, Mr Salteena's Plan. London: Chatto and Windus, 1919
  • Daisy Ashford: Her Book: A Collection of the Remaining Novels. London: George H. Doran and Company, 1920
  • Love and Marriage: Three Stories. London: Hart-Davis, 1965
  • Where Love Lies Deepest. London: Hart-Davis, 1966
  • The Hangman's Daughter and Other Stories. Oxford University Press 1983 (Includes The Life of Father McSwiney)

See also

  • Child prodigy

References

Further reading

  • Malcomson, R. M. (1984). Daisy Ashford: Her Life. Hogarth Press.
  • "Ashford [married name Devlin], Margaret Mary Julia [Daisy] (1881–1972), child writer". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Retrieved 9 July 2019, from https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-30769.
  • "Daisy Ashford a Very Real Young Lady", 31 August 1919, The New York Times Book Review, Page 74