At the Circulating Library Author Information: Mary Crawford Fraser

Author: Mary Crawford Fraser (1851–1922)

Alternate Name(s): Crawford (maiden name); Mrs. Hugh Fraser (familiar name)

Biography: Mary Crawford Fraser was born in 1851 in Rome, the daughter of the American sculptor Thomas Crawford (1813–1857) and Louisa Ward (1823–1897). Her father is best known for sculpting the statue of Freedom on the U.S. Capitol building and her mother was the sister of Julia Ward Howe. She is the sister of novelists Anne Crawford and F. Marion Crawford. In 1874, she married the diplomat Hugh Fraser (1837–1894) and the couple lived in various places in the world. At his last posting in Japan, Hugh died suddenly in 1894. Mary returned to Europe where her brother helped her become an author beginning with the novel The Brown Ambassador (1895). Many of her later novels are set in Japan. She also wrote the memoir A Diplomatist's Wife in Japan (1898). Her son, John Fraser also wrote a novel. She died in 1922.


References: John C. Moran, An F. Marion Crawford Companion (Greenwood Press, 1981); Sutherland

Fiction Titles:

  1. The Brown Ambassador: A Story of the Three Days' Moon.  1 vol.  London: Macmillan, 1895.
  2. Palladia.  1 vol.  London: Macmillan, 1896.
  3. Dora Murray's Ideal and How It Came to Her.  1 vol.  London: R. T. S., 1896.
  4. The Looms of Time.  1 vol.  London: William Isbister, 1898.
  5. A Chapter of Accidents.  1 vol.  London: Macmillan, 1898.
  6. The Customs of the Country: Tales of New Japan.  1 vol.  London: Hutchinson, 1899.
  7. The Splendid Porsenna.  1 vol.  London: Hutchinson, 1899.
  8. Marna's Mutiny.  1 vol.  London: Hutchinson, 1901.
  9. A Little Grey Sheep: A Novel.  1 vol.  London: Hutchinson, 1901.