Fanny Kemble was born into the most famous acting dynasty of the London stage. Unlike her aunt, the legendary Sarah Siddons, Fanny did not want to be an actress. However, when her father, the actor-manager of Covent Garden, faced bankruptcy in 1829, her appearance as Juliet made her a star. Touring America in 1832, Fanny met Philadelphian Pierce Butler and left the stage for love. Once a wife, she learned, to her horror, that the Butler wealth came from a slave plantation in Georgia. Challenging the conventions of her day and her husband, she insisted on speaking out—and discovered that marriage could not contain the independent woman she had become.