Agnes Strickland was one of the key figures in the development of writing on women’s history. With her sister Elizabeth she wrote the 'Lives of the Queens of England', described as an important landmark in the development of the biographical genre, between 1830 and 1848. When Queen Victoria became engaged in 1840, Strickland’s publisher commissioned her to write an account of the young Queen’s life from her birth to her marriage. Though this two-volume biography of Queen Victoria’s early years presents her in a favourable light, the Queen was very critical of it, writing corrections and comments in the margins: next to ‘Her majesty rises generally at six o’clock’ she has written ‘Never before ½ p. 9 or 10’. Along with interjections such as ‘not true’ and ‘utterly false’, lengthier comments give Queen Victoria’s own account of the key events of her early life and reign, such as hearing of her accession, and her engagement to Prince Albert. Copies of this biography are rare, and it has been alleged that following the Queen’s criticism they were pulped.