Special Collections and Archives
Bessie Marchant (1862-1941) who also wrote under the pseudonym of John Comfort was a novelist of adventure novels for children. She published about one hundred and fifty books from 1892 to 1941. Her earliest novels were influenced by her evangelical Christian background. In the 1920s to 1930s, her girl’s boarding-school stories became very popular.
Even though she had never visited other countries, she researched about them at the Bodleian Library in Oxford, and through the pages of the National Geographic magazine. She also received letter from girls around the world.
The collection consists of:
E-book versions of her texts can be found on the Internet Archive.
The collection has been catalogued by Yosselin Claudio Montano whilst volunteering with the library.
You can also read about her connection with Kent at Kent Maps Online.
Contents: correspondence, photographs, magazine articles
Period: 19th-20th century
Subjects: literature, biography, adventure stories, girls boarding school stories, evangelical Christian stories