Charlotte Bronte, Author of Jane Eyre, Dies During Pregnancy

Charlotte Brontë (21 April 1816 – 31 March 1855) was an English novelist and poet, the eldest of the three Brontë sisters who survived into adulthood and whose novels became classics of English literature. She is best known for her novel Jane Eyre, which she published under the gender neutral pen name Currer Bell.

Jane Eyre went on to become a success in publication, and is widely held in high regard in the gothic fiction genre of literature.

Brontë became pregnant soon after her wedding, but her health declined rapidly and, according to Gaskell, she was attacked by “sensations of perpetual nausea and ever-recurring faintness”.

She died, with her unborn child, on 31 March 1855, three weeks before her 39th birthday. Her death certificate gives the cause of death as phthisis, but biographers including Claire Harman and others suggest that she died from dehydration and malnourishment due to vomiting caused by severe morning sickness or hyperemesis gravidarum.[51] Brontë was buried in the family vault in the Church of St Michael and All Angels at Haworth.