Henrietta Maria Moriarty
British author and botanical artist
Henrietta Maria Moriarty (née Godfrey) (1781–1842) was an English novelist and botanical illustrator noted for some novels, Brighton in an Uproar Comprising Anecdotes... a Novel Founded on Facts (1812), Crim. Con. - A Novel, Founded on Facts (1812), A Hero of Salamanca: or, The Novice Isabel (1813), and Viridarium (1807), a collection of 50 coloured plates of greenhouse plants which went through two editions and was largely based on plates which appeared in Curtis’s Botanical Magazine.
Life
Christened on 22 February 1781 at Romsey, Hampshire, she was the daughter of Major Benjamin Godfrey of the Inniskilling Dragoons and his wife Henrietta. On 9 July 1796, with the apparent consent of her widowed mother, she was married to Matthew Moriarty of Chatham, Kent, a Major in the Royal Marines. Matthew Moriarty was not a good provider and his early death left numerous debts and a destitute widow with 4 children. Henrietta took in two or three ladies as boarders in order to generate some income. Since drawing had always been one of her accomplishments, it was suggested that she publish a botanical work by subscription. Whilst living at Boley Hill near Rochester she produced a set of 50 plates which, for the greater part, were copied from Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, seemingly with no copyright objections and published in 1807.
The public source identifies “Henrietta Maria Moriarty” as british author and botanical artist. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Henrietta, Maria and Moriarty.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q36576638. VIAF identifies the subject as 91111723. The Library of Congress control number is no2009101053. 2 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 1 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1781, 1842, 1812 and 1813.
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This entry incorporates text from “Henrietta Maria Moriarty” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.