Anna Laetitia Barbauld, an English writer, born at Kibworth-IIarcourt, Leicestershire, June 20, 1743, died at Stoke-Newington, near London, March 9, 1825. She displayed unusual talent as a child, and her early education was directed with care by her father, the Rev. John Aikin, a Unitarian minister. At the age of 15 she removed with him to Warrington in Lancashire, where he took charge of the academy, out of which grew the central Unitarian college, afterward transferred to York, and finally established in Manchester. In 1773, at the age of 30, she published a volume of her poems, which the same year ran through four editions. This was followed by " Miscellaneous Pieces in Prose," partly written by her brother John Aikin. In 1774 she married the Rev. Rochemont Barbauld, with whom she kept a school for the next 11 years in the village of Palgrave, Suffolk. During this period she published "Devotional Pieces, compiled from the Psalms of David," "Early Lessons for Children," and "Hymns in Prose for Children." After a short visit to the continent in 1785-'6, Mrs. Barbauld went to live at Hampstead, near London, where her husband became pastor of a small congregation, and she took charge of a few pupils.

Here she wrote several pamphlets and poems on popular subjects, such as the removal of the civil disabilities of the dissenters and the abolition of the slave trade, and various contributions to her brother's "Evenings at Home." In 1802 she removed with her husband to Stoke-Newing-ton, and there passed the rest of her life. Here she prepared "Selections from the Spectator, Guardian, Tatler, and Freeholder," with a preliminary essay. She wrote the life of Richardson, the novelist, to accompany his correspondence, edited Akenside's "Pleasures of the Imagination" and Collins's "Odes," and a collection of the "British Novelists," with memoirs and criticisms, and published "The Female Spectator," a miscellany of prose and verse. Her last separate publication, "Eighteen Hundred and Eleven" (1812), is her longest and most highly finished poem. Her works, in two volumes, were edited, with a memoir, by her niece, Miss Lucy Aikin. Her writings are distinguished for their pure moral tone, simplicity, and earnestness, and her books for children are among the best of their class.