Pteridomania, The Illustrated London News

Helen Mary Elizabeth Paterson was born in Swadlincote, a village in Derbyshire, England. She was the oldest of the seven children of Alexander Paterson, a rural physician, and Mary Chance Herford, daughter of a wine merchant. After the death of her father during a local diphtheria epidemic, the family moved to Birmingham, where, at the age of seventeen, Helen secured a place in the Royal Female School of Art in London. In 1867 she was accepted into the Royal Academy School. She began working as a commercial artist, and her commissions included providing the illustrations for Thomas Hardy's "Far from the Madding Crowd". Helen's work now began to bring her into contact with many of London's most prominent writers and artists. Her path crossed with that of William Allingham, renowned Irish poet and editor of Fraser's magazine. They married on August 22nd 1874.