This Goodly Land

Anne Royall

Dates

June 11, 1769 - October 1, 1854

Other Names Used

• Anne Newport: birth name

Alabama Connection

Selected Works

• Royall, Anne. Sketches of History, Life, and Manners in the United States. New Haven, Conn.: n.p., 1826. Rpt. New York: Johnson Reprint Corp., 1970. An online version of Sketches is available from Google Books.
• Royall, Anne. The Tennessean: A Novel, Founded on Facts. New Haven, Conn.: n.p., 1827.
• Royall, Anne. The Black Book, or, A Continuation of Travels in the United States. New Haven, Conn.: n.p., 1828.
• Royall, Anne. Mrs. Royall's Pennsylvania, or, Travels Continued in the United States. Washington, D.C.: n.p., 1829. An online version of Mrs. Royall’s Pennsylvania is available from Google Books.
• Royall, Anne. Letters from Alabama on Various Subjects. Washington, D.C.: n.p., 1830. Rpt. as Letters from Alabama, 1817-1822. University: University of Alabama Press, 1969. An online version of Letters from Alabama is available from Google Books.
• Royall, Anne. Mrs. Royall's Southern Tour, or, Second Series of the Black Book. Washington, D.C.: n.p., 1830. An online version of Mrs. Royall’s Southern Tour, Vol. I is available from Internet Archive’s American Libraries.

Biographical Information

Anne Royall was born in Baltimore in 1769. Her family moved to the pioneer community of Mount Pisgah in western Pennsylvania in 1772. Following the deaths of Royall’s father and step-father, her family moved to Sweet Springs, Va. (now W. Va.). Royall’s mother worked for a Revolutionary War major, who befriended Royall and allowed her to study the books in his library. Royall and the major married in 1797. When he died in 1812, his relatives contested the will and froze most of the estate’s assets. The will was upheld in 1817, but the relatives appealed. While awaiting the new trial, Royall traveled the Alabama Territory from Huntsville westward to the Muscle Shoals area. In 1819, the appeals court set aside the major’s will, and Royall returned to Alabama, living there for four years on her greatly-reduced inheritance. When her money ran out, Royall petitioned Congress for the pension due her as the widow of a Revolutionary War officer. She also decided to become an author. Royall traveled around the United States collecting material for her books, soliciting donations, and selling subscriptions.

Sketches of History, Life, and Manners in the United States was the first of five travel books Royall produced. They were popular, but her undiplomatic frankness and attacks on political movements that she opposed earned her many enemies. A storekeeper in Burlington, Vt., pushed her down a set of stairs. In Washington, D.C., she was tried and convicted of being a “common scold.” A Pittsburgh bookstore clerk beat her with a leather whip. In 1831, Royall stopped traveling and settled in Washington, D.C. She began publishing Paul Pry, a newspaper intended to expose government incompetence and corruption. Paul Pry was always financially precarious, and, in 1836, Royall shut it down and started another paper, The Huntress. In 1848, Congress finally allowed Royall her pension. Royall’s health declined, but she continued publishing The Huntress until the summer of 1854. She died later that year at the age of eighty-five and was buried in the Congressional Cemetery.

Interests and Themes

Anne Royall’s travel books describe the places she saw, the people she encountered, and the transportation methods she used. They provide a glimpse of American life in the early Nineteenth Century, despite the sharply critical, partisan nature of her writing. Letters from Alabama is a collection of letters written while she was living and travelling in the state.

For More Information

Please check your local library for these materials. If items are not available locally, your librarian can help you borrow them through the InterLibrary Loan program. Your librarian can also help you find other information about this author.

There may be more information available through the databases in the Alabama Virtual Library. If you are an Alabama citizen, AVL can be used at your public library or school library media center. You can also get a username and password from your librarian to use AVL at home.

Reference Articles

• Beasley, Maurine. "The Curious Career of Anne Royall." Journalism History 3.4 (1976): 98-102, 136.
• Clapp, Elizabeth J. "The Boundaries of Femininity: The Travels and Writings of Mrs. Anne Royall, 1823-31." American Nineteenth Century History 4.3 (2003): 1-28.
• Dodd, Don, and Ben Williams. "‘A Common Scold’: Anne Royall." American History Illustrated Jan. 1976: 32-38.
• Griffith, Lucille. "Anne Royall in Alabama." Alabama Review 21.1 (1968): 53-63.

Reference Book Chapters and Encyclopedia Entries

• Williams, Benjamin Buford. "Literary Beginnings." A Literary History of Alabama: The Nineteenth Century. Rutherford, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1979. 13-57.

Reference Web Sites

• Earman, Cynthia. "An Uncommon Scold: Treasure-Talk Describes Life of Anne Royall." Library of Congress Information Bulletin. 2000. Library of Congress. http://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/0001/royall.html

Last updated on 2009-10-01.