The following webpage is a requirement for an third year undergraduate University English course and it is about the life of Ann Yearsley. Ann was famous for her poetry, particularly during her patronage with Hannah More. Yearsley was born Ann Cormartie in 1753. While records do not give her exact date of birth, Mary Waldron, in her entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography gives her date of baptism as: "[...] 15 July 1753 [...] at St. Andrew's Church in Clifton, near Bristol, the daughter of John and Ann Comartie" (Waldron). Her childhood was spent as a milkwoman, which earned her the name "The Bristol Milkwoman" , with her mother. Ann married in 1774 and had seven children. Around this time, she became involved in a patronage with Hannah More. "[...] some of whom have argued that the breakdown of the patronage relationship between Hannah More and Yearsley was inevitable, either because Yearsley was insufficently grateful for the help she recieved, or because More was overly controlling of her talented protegee" (Andrews 90). Yearsley would continue to live with her mother until she died in 1784. "Yearsley and her young family, as well as Yearsley's mother, had been found on the brink of starvation. They were rescued by a local gentleman, but not in time to save Yearsley's mother, who died shortly after" (Andrews 91).
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