Person

Wood, Sally Sayward Barrell Keating

1759–1855

Sarah "Sally" Sayward Barrell Keating Wood (Oct. 1, 1759-Jan. 6, 1854) was an American novelist. She is considered the first American female writer of gothic fiction. She was born in York, Me., the first daughter of Sarah Sayward Barrell and the British army officer Nathaniel Barrell, but was heavily influenced by her weathly grandfather, Judge Jonathan Sayward. On Oct. 23, 1778 she was married to Richard Keating, who died of a fever five years later. The couple had two daughters and a son. Later she married General Abiel Wood. He died in 1811, and Sally thereafter moved to Portland, Maine. Sally Wood was an author of gothic novels who wrote under the pen name "A Lady of Massachusetts". After Maine became a state in 1820, she changed her pen name to "A Lady of Maine". To her readers, however, she was better known as Madame Wood