Elizabeth Hamilton (writer)  Elizabeth Hamilton (1756 or 1758 – 23 July 1816) was a Scottish essayist, poet, satirist and novelist. She was most probably born on 25 July 1756, though the date is often given as 1758. She was born in Belfast, the third and youngest child of husband, Charles Hamilton ("d".1759), a Scottish merchant, and his wife Katherine Mackay ("d".1767). In 1762, after the death of her father, her mother sent her to live with her paternal aunt, Mrs Marshall who lived near Stirling. In 1772, she lived at Ingram's Crook near Bannockburn. Her first literary efforts were directed in supporting her brother Charles in his orientalist and linguistic studies. After his death in 1792 she continued to publish orientalist scholarship, as well as historical, educationalist and theoretical works. She wrote "The Cottagers of Glenburnie" (1808), a tale which had much popularity in its day, and perhaps had some effect in the improvement of certain aspects of humble domestic life in Scotland. She also wrote the anti-Jacobin novel "Memoirs of Modern Philosophers" (1800), and the satirical "Translation of the Letters of a Hindoo Rajah" in 1796, a work in the tradition of Montesquieu and Goldsmith. Her most important pedagogical works are "Letters on Education" (1801), "Letters on the Elementary Principles of Education" (1801), "Letters addressed to the Daughter of a Nobleman, on the Formation of Religious and Moral Principle" (1806), and "Hints addressed to the Patrons and Directors of Schools" (1815). Hamilton spent much of her later life in Edinburgh. She died in Harrogate, England after a short illness.