author
F. Jewell
Best known for Little Abe; or, The Bishop of Berry Brow, this little-documented 19th-century writer captured the life of a Yorkshire Methodist preacher with warmth and plainspoken faith. The surviving record suggests a writer based in Hull, England, with a strong interest in religious biography.
1 Audiobook
About the author
F. Jewell is an obscure late-19th-century author whose identity is not clearly documented in the sources readily available online. What can be confirmed is that Jewell wrote Little Abe; or, The Bishop of Berry Brow, a life of Abraham Lockwood, described on the title page as a "quaint and popular Yorkshire local preacher in the Methodist New Connexion."
The book's preface is signed from Bethel Villa, Hull, and dated 1880, which places Jewell in Hull, England at the time of publication. In that preface, the author says the work was assembled with help from friends and intended to give a faithful, readable account of Lockwood's life and character.
Because so little reliable biographical information about F. Jewell survives in standard reference sources, the author is best approached through the work itself: a piece of Victorian religious life-writing rooted in Yorkshire Methodism, community memory, and an earnest desire to preserve the story of a local preacher for future readers.