Which Novel Made Elizabeth Gaskell Famous?

Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell, wife of a Unitarian Minister in Manchester, began writing a novel as a distraction from her grief at the death of her baby son. The novel, published in 1848, was "Mary Barton." It caught the attention of Charles dickens, who asked her to write for him, and her success was assured. "Mary Barton" was unusual at the time because the main characters were all working class, and their struggles were depicted in a realistic way. Mary is the daughter of a trade union activist, who is persuaded by his starving fellow-workers to kill Henry Carson, the son of a prominent mill owner. Suspicion falls on Jem, Mary's former suitor whom she has rejected because she was dazzled by young Carson's advances to her. Mary manages to clear Jem without revealing her father's guilt, though in fact the truth does become known before he dies. In the end Mary and Jem are married.