Charles Kingsley was born into a religious family in Devon and he was educated in London. Following his father’s path, Kingsley became a priest. He quickly rose in importance within the Church and in 1859 was awarded an enormous honour by being appointed chaplain to Queen Victoria. In this high-status role he attended ceremonial occasions and held religious services at important national events. Kingsley’s reputation grew and he was later appointed as a professor of history at the University of Cambridge and, in 1873, to the clergy of Westminster Abbey in London.

Kingsley was a strong believer that the ethics and morals of Christianity could solve problems caused by greed. He believed these issues were a growing problem as the Victorian world became more motivated by industry and money. These beliefs were a major theme of his writing. He also enjoyed using his considerable historical knowledge in his novels Westward Ho! and The Water Babies. While he mostly wrote novels, he was also a poet and he was particularly interested in writing ballads. His poems were published in the collection Andromeda and Other Poems in 1858. He died in Hampshire in 1875.