Kate Scott Turner

Catherine Mary Scott Turner (March 12, 1831 – 1917) was an American poet and a friend of poet Emily Dickinson.^[1] She was also known as Kate Anthon.

Kate Scott Turner
Turner in 1859
Born	Catherine Mary Scott (1831-03-12)March 12, 1831 Cooperstown, New York, U.S.
Died	1917(1917-00-00) (aged 85–86) England
Spouses	Campbell Ladd Turner ​ ​ (m. 1855; died 1857)​ John Anthon ​ ​ (m. 1866; died 1874)​

In September 2012, the Amherst College Archives and Special Collections unveiled this daguerreotype, proposing it to be Dickinson and her friend Kate Scott Turner (c. 1859); it has not been authenticated.

Overview

Catherine Mary ("Kate") Scott was the daughter of Henry Scott of Cooperstown, New York.^[2] She attended the Utica Female Seminary, where in 1848 she met Susan Gilbert, who married Emily Dickinson's brother Austin Dickinson.^[3] The women remained friends until Susan's death^[4] in 1913.^[5]

In 1855, she married Campbell Ladd Turner, who died in 1857 of tuberculosis.^[2][4] Turner was acquainted with Emily Dickinson through Susan, and they remained so until the mid-1860s.^[3] Turner married for a second time in 1866 to John Hone Anthon, who died eight years later. She died in 1917 in England, having lived most of her life outside of the United States.^[2]

Emily Dickinson

She met Emily Dickinson in 1859.^[2] From that time until about 1862, Dickinson sent her four poems.^[3] One poem was sent with a pair of garters that Dickinson had knitted for her:

When Katie walks, this simple pair accompany her side,
When Katie runs unwearied they follow on the road,
When Katie kneels, their loving hands still clasp her pious knee —
Ah! Katie! Smile at Fortune, with two so knit to thee!

— Emily Dickinson^[3]