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Biographies — page 29
2,466 public-domain biographies books, summarised. Page 29 of 52.
Memoirs of William Wordsworth
George S. (George Searle) Phillips
This biographical study chronicles the life and poetic evolution of the man who redefined English literature by seeking the divine in the quiet landscapes of nature. It presents a portrait of a dedicated, often solitary figure who transformed his own internal development into a permanent, meditative legacy.
On the Fringe of the Great Fight
George Gallie Nasmith
This personal account chronicles a Canadian scientist’s experience behind the front lines of the Great War, documenting the grim realities of field medicine, sanitation, and the profound psychological shift of a generation at war.
Prisons & Prisoners: Some Personal Experiences
Lytton, Constance, Lady
The struggle for women’s suffrage in Edwardian England reveals itself here not through distant political theory, but through the visceral, jolting reality of the prison cell and the hunger strike.
Superwomen
Albert Payson Terhune
These profiles explore the lives of women throughout history who wielded extraordinary personal influence, challenging conventions and shaping the destinies of powerful men.
Voyages of Samuel De Champlain
Samuel de Champlain
An intrepid explorer chronicles his persistent efforts to establish a French presence in the rugged, untamed wilderness of seventeenth-century Canada. These journals capture the intersection of colonial ambition, complex diplomacy, and first-hand discovery.
Blue-beard: A Contribution to History and Folk-lore: Being the history of Gilles de Retz of Brittany, France, who was executed at Nantes in 1440 A.D., and who was the original of Blue-beard in the tales of Mother Goose
Thomas Wilson
A celebrated Marshal of France, once a comrade-in-arms to Joan of Arc, descends into unimaginable darkness. This investigation unearths the true history of the nobleman who became the blueprint for the legend of Bluebeard.
The life of the emperor Francis Joseph
Francis Henry Gribble
The long, shadowed reign of the last great Habsburg monarch reveals a life caught between the crushing weight of imperial tradition and the inexorable rise of modern nationalism. It is a study of a man defined by the tragedy he could not escape.
The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Volume 09: the False Nun
Giacomo Casanova
A charismatic adventurer navigates the perilous, glittering intrigues of 18th-century Venice, where every pleasure masks a potential trap and every romance carries the weight of inevitable ruin.
A boys' life of Booker T. Washington
Walter Clinton Jackson
Born into slavery, a young boy finds a path to literacy, founds a world-renowned institution, and becomes a defining voice for his people. This biography chronicles a life of relentless industry and service.
Adventures in the Rifle Brigade, in the Peninsula, France, and the Netherlands: from 1809 to 1815
J. (John) Kincaid
A soldier’s account of the Napoleonic Wars, capturing the grit, exhaustion, and camaraderie of the front lines through the eyes of an officer in the legendary Rifle Brigade.
Charles Lamb: A Memoir
Barry Cornwall
A quiet, steady life defined by immense devotion, this memoir explores the spirit of a man who transformed personal tragedy into a legacy of gentle, enduring humor.
Diary of Samuel Pepys
Samuel Pepys
A candid, obsessive, and remarkably intimate account of 17th-century life, this record captures the daily textures of a man navigating the corridors of power and the quiet corners of his own home.
Dorothy Payne, Quakeress: A Side-Light Upon the Career of 'Dolly' Madison
Ella K. (Ella Kent) Barnard
This biographical study traces the life of Dolley Madison, moving from her strict Quaker upbringing in colonial Virginia to her central role in the social and political life of the early American republic.
From the Bottom Up: The Life Story of Alexander Irvine
Alexander Irvine
This memoir traces a transformative journey from a childhood of crushing poverty in Ireland to a life of radical social ministry and political activism in America. It is a testament to one man’s relentless search for meaning amid the suffering of the urban poor.
Letters of Ulysses S. Grant to his father and his youngest sister, 1857-78
Ulysses S. (Ulysses Simpson) Grant
These private letters offer an intimate, unvarnished window into the domestic life and evolving mindset of a man who rose from obscurity to lead a nation through its most harrowing existential crisis.
Life of Tecumseh, and of His Brother the Prophet: With a Historical Sketch of the Shawanoe Indians
Benjamin Drake
A visionary Shawnee leader strives to unite the tribes of North America against encroaching settlers, culminating in a dramatic and doomed stand for sovereignty during the War of 1812.
The Days of My Life: An Autobiography
Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
This is a story of a young woman’s headstrong pride and the sobering realities of marriage, inheritance, and the quiet, persistent demands of duty. It traces how a sheltered, isolated girl finds her way to a more grounded life.
The Death-Blow to Spiritualism: Being the True Story of the Fox Sisters
Reuben Briggs Davenport
Two young sisters ignited a global obsession with the dead by cracking their toe joints. This account chronicles their long-delayed confession and their final, desperate bid to dismantle the spiritualist movement they birthed.
The Prime Minister
Harold Spender
This portrait of David Lloyd George follows the rise of a village boy from humble beginnings to the leadership of the British Empire during the world’s most perilous hour.
The Story of John Wesley, Told to Boys and Girls
Marianne Kirlew
The life of a legendary preacher is here reimagined as an epic of moral endurance, transforming historical biography into a series of vivid, instructive lessons for the young.
After Prison--What?
Maud Ballington Booth
True redemption begins when society stops seeing a convict as a criminal and starts recognizing the human being underneath. This work serves as an urgent, compassionate plea for the dignity and rehabilitation of those behind bars.
Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3), Essay 3: Condorcet
John Morley
This study examines the life and intellectual legacy of the Marquis de Condorcet, a central figure of the French Enlightenment whose tragic end in the Revolution contrasts sharply with his boundless optimism for human progress.
Lives of Eminent Zoologists, from Aristotle to Linnæus: with Introductory remarks on the Study of Natural History
William MacGillivray
To trace the development of natural history is to witness the slow, meticulous accumulation of knowledge, where each generation of observers builds upon the fractured records of the past to map the living world.
McClure's Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 4, March, 1896
Various
This collection serves as a time capsule from 1896, blending meticulous historical inquiry, short fiction, and practical science to capture the intellectual spirit of the late nineteenth century.
Obed Hussey, Who, of All Inventors, Made Bread Cheap
Unknown
A persistent, principled inventor fights decades of commercial hostility to secure recognition for his mechanical reaper, a machine that fundamentally changed the nature of global agriculture.
Ravished Armenia: The Story of Aurora Mardiganian, the Christian Girl Who Lived Through the Great Massacres
Aurora Mardiganian
This harrowing personal narrative documents the systematic destruction of a culture and the resilience of a young girl forced to witness the unraveling of her world. It serves as a stark, indelible testament to the Armenian Genocide.
Stories of Great Inventors: Fulton, Whitney, Morse, Cooper, Edison
Hattie E. Macomber
HOOK These biographical sketches follow the lives of five transformative figures, detailing how curiosity, resilience, and hard work turned humble boys into the architects of the modern industrial age.
Story-Lives of Great Musicians
Francis Jameson Rowbotham
Great musicians, often remembered only by the cold marble of their busts, were once young dreamers struggling against poverty and indifference. These vivid biographical sketches reveal the human pulse behind the world's most enduring compositions.
The Great German Composers
George T. (George Titus) Ferris
The history of German music is a chronicle of profound transformation, tracing the evolution of symphonic and operatic expression through the lives of the masters who defined the art.
The Makers of Canada: Champlain
N.-E. (Narcisse-Eutrope) Dionne
Samuel Champlain stands as the architect of New France, a figure defined by his unwavering resolve to establish a permanent French presence in North America amidst constant hardship and colonial neglect.
Abraham Lincoln: The People's Leader in the Struggle for National Existence
George Haven Putnam
This historical portrait elevates the figure of Abraham Lincoln as the essential moral and political anchor during the nation's most perilous fracture. It bridges the gap between the constitutional debates of the nineteenth century and the battlefield realities of the Civil War.
Admirals of the British Navy: Portraits in Colours with Introductory and Biographical Notes
Unknown
A gallery of naval leaders captured in mid-war portraits offers a steadying window into the quiet, disciplined men holding the line across the North Sea.
Georges Guynemer: Knight of the Air
Henry Bordeaux
This biography chronicles the meteoric life and final flight of Georges Guynemer, the legendary French fighter pilot of the First World War. It serves as a study of singular, sacrificial courage during one of history's most grueling conflicts.
My Experiences in a Lunatic Asylum: By a Sane Patient
Herman Charles Merivale
Unchecked legal power can convert a temporary nervous breakdown into a lifelong sentence, locking a sane man inside a private asylum where his every attempt to prove his sanity is weaponized against him as further evidence of madness.
Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett: With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes
Samuel Johnson
This collection gathers the voices of four distinct eighteenth-century minds, showcasing the era’s mastery of sharp-witted satire, melancholic reflection, and the rigorous discipline of poetic form. It offers a portal into a time when poetry served as the primary instrument for social critique and intellectual debate.
The Grimké sisters
Catherine H. Birney
Born into the Southern aristocracy, two sisters turned their backs on the comfort of their slave-holding heritage to become the country’s most vocal and courageous pioneers for abolition and women’s rights.
The World As I Have Found It: Sequel to Incidents in the Life of a Blind Girl
Mary L. Day
This memoir chronicles the resilient, itinerant life of a blind woman navigating the social landscapes and moral complexities of late 19th-century America. It is a testament to the power of self-reliance and the kindness of strangers.
A War-time Journal, Germany 1914 and German Travel Notes
Jephson, Harriet Julia Campbell, Lady
Trapped in a German spa town as World War I breaks out, an Englishwoman observes her former hosts turn overnight into hostile enemies.
Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 2
Alfred Russel Wallace
A Victorian co-discoverer of evolutionary theory reflects on a lifetime of bold scientific debate, late-life domestic peace, radical social proposals, and relentless intellectual curiosity.
Carry On: Letters in War-Time
Coningsby Dawson
A sensitive writer leaves his peaceful life behind to serve on the Western Front, discovering that the brutal test of war yields an unexpected and profound spiritual strength.
Comrade Kropotkin
Victor Robinson
An aristocrat abandons his high position to join a underground network fighting a brutal autocratic state, enduring imprisonment, harrowing escape, and exile to carry his message across continents.
Memoir of Mary L. Ware, Wife of Henry Ware, Jr
Edward B. (Edward Brooks) Hall
A steadfast nineteenth-century New England woman transforms everyday domestic duty, quiet self-sacrifice, and intense personal grief into a life of profound religious grace and heroic devotion to others.
Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals: In Two Volumes, Volume I
Samuel Finley Breese Morse
A gifted young painter sets sail for the studios of Europe, unaware that his true masterpiece will be forged in copper wire and electrical currents rather than canvas and oil.
Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons: Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben
Frederick Arthur Ambrose Talbot
Trapped behind enemy lines at the outbreak of the First World War, an ordinary civilian must use his wits to survive brutal camps, harsh solitary confinement, and systematic starvation.
The Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
A life defined by the pursuit of emotional truth reveals how memory, passion, and conscience shape a man's inner world.
The Red Book of Heroes
Mrs. Lang
Duty and devotion demand a cost that the world rarely understands.
Youth and Egolatry
Pío Baroja
A sharp, unembellished self-portrait reveals a mind at war with societal dogmas, institutional authority, and its own restless nature.
An American Patrician, or The Story of Aaron Burr: Illustrated
Alfred Henry Lewis
An ambitious, brilliant American officer rises through the Revolutionary War to the pinnacle of early republic politics, only to see his vast dreams crumble into scandal, exile, and lonely old age.