Cordelia Frances Biddle Channels Martha Beale
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My passion for the early Victorian era that serves as backdrop
for the Martha Beale Mystery Series began with research into my
Biddle and Drexel ancestors. Financiers Nicholas Biddle and
Francis Martin Drexel were powerful men who shaped the city –
and nation’s – growth and politics. The 1840s in Philadelphia
were tumultuous years. A cultured and educated elite confronted
grinding poverty, race riots and a legal system made obsolete by
a rapidly expanding metropolis. Until the Consolidation Act of
1854, a criminal could escape justice by crossing from one city
district into another. This is fertile soil for a novelist with
murder and mayhem in her heart!
As a descendent of the Biddle line historians refer to as “The Romantics” (as opposed to “the Solids”), I see ghosts abounding as I walk our twenty-first century streets. The contrast between classes during the 1840s remains visual and visceral to me: the inmates of the almshouse known as Blockley, the “rag and bone men," the stylish devotees of Godey’s Lady’s Book and its monthly “Fashion Plates," the practitioners of the (sometimes suspect) vogue of memorial daguerreotypes. Because modern Philadelphia retains so much of its original architecture, I can’t pass the Mercantile Exchange or William Strickland’s Parthenon-inspired Second Bank of the United States without an eerie sense of déjà vu.
I invite you to journey back in time with me – and of course my alter-ego, the determined and immensely clever Martha Beale as she uncovers crimes among rich and poor alike. You may also find Martha on FACEBOOK. For a Victorian lady, she can be quite the progressive woman...
As a descendent of the Biddle line historians refer to as “The Romantics” (as opposed to “the Solids”), I see ghosts abounding as I walk our twenty-first century streets. The contrast between classes during the 1840s remains visual and visceral to me: the inmates of the almshouse known as Blockley, the “rag and bone men," the stylish devotees of Godey’s Lady’s Book and its monthly “Fashion Plates," the practitioners of the (sometimes suspect) vogue of memorial daguerreotypes. Because modern Philadelphia retains so much of its original architecture, I can’t pass the Mercantile Exchange or William Strickland’s Parthenon-inspired Second Bank of the United States without an eerie sense of déjà vu.
I invite you to journey back in time with me – and of course my alter-ego, the determined and immensely clever Martha Beale as she uncovers crimes among rich and poor alike. You may also find Martha on FACEBOOK. For a Victorian lady, she can be quite the progressive woman...
Mysteries by Author:
- The Martha Beale series:
- The Conjurer
- Deception's Daughter
- Without Fear
- co-authored as Nero Blanc
- The Nero Blanc Crossword Mystery Series
Other Books by Author:
- Beneath The Wind
- Murder At Saint Simeon
- a biography of St. Katharine Drexel (upcoming)