The Female Husband: or, the Surprising History of Mrs. Mary, alias Mr. Charles Hamilton, who was Convicted of having Married a young Woman of Wells and Lived with her as her Husband (1746)

(from Charles Hamilton's Wikipedia page)

“Henry Fielding is generally considered one of the great classic English novelists, best known for his novels Joseph Andrews (1742) and Tom Jones (1749). In 1746, Fielding anonymously published this novelette, which is a fictionalized account of the story of "Mary Hamilton", who became notorious as the female husband. Hamilton grew up in Scotland and began wearing her brother’s male clothes when she was 14 years old. On July 16, 1746, using the name Charles Hamilton, she married her niece Mary Price in Wells, Somerset.

After two months, Mary Price decided she had been deceived and complained to the authorities. After a long debate about what exactly her crime was, Hamilton was tried and convicted of fraud under the Vagrancy Act of 1744. The court found that she had married fourteen wives. Fielding claimed that his information came “from the mouth” of Hamilton herself, but it is unlikely that he ever met her.

The historian Louis Crompton says his story is probably “one part fact to ten parts fiction.” To make this inexpensive pamphlet appeal to a large audience, Fielding changed the story into a melodrama, describing the corruption of Hamilton’s innocence, multiple escapes from wives, and a chance encounter with a previous acquaintance, accompanied by pious commentary.

This work is important to understanding Fielding’s thinking and the moralistic but prurient attitudes of his time.”

The first 12 pages of this document are the transcribed text in Modern English of pages 13 to 37.

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Language: English

Resource type: biography, news publication, news story

Found on: TransReads

Format: PDF

Uploaded: February 21st, 2026.

Last updated: February 21st, 2026.