Allen, Elizabeth Chase (1832–1911)

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Allen, Elizabeth Chase (1832–1911)

American poet. Name variations: Elizabeth Akers Allen and Elizabeth Chase Akers; (pseudonym) Florence Percy. Born Elizabeth Anne Chase in Strong, Maine, Oct 9, 1832; died in Tuckahoe, New York, Aug 7, 1911; attended Farmington Academy (later Maine State Teachers College); m. Marshall S.M. Taylor, 1851 (div.); m. Benjamin Paul Akers (Maine sculptor), 1860 (died 1861); m. Elijah M. Allen, 1865.

Under pseudonym Florence Percy, published 1st book of poems, Forest Buds from the Woods of Maine (1856); as Elizabeth Akers, published Poems (1866), containing the once-popular ballad "Rock Me to Sleep" which opened with the familiar lines: "Backward, turn backward, O time, in your flight,/ And make me a child again, just for to-night"; other works include The Silver Bridge (1866), Queen Catherine's Rose (1885), Two Saints: A Tribute to the Memory of Henry Bergh (founder of the ASPCA, 1888), The High-Top Sweeting (1891), The Ballad of the Bronx (1901), and The Sunset Song (1902); a correspondent for Maine's Portland Transcript and the Boston Evening Gazette, was also a frequent contributor to the Atlantic Monthly.

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