AustLit

Violet Pettengell was most likely born in Bega (south-east New South Wales) in March 1886, to Francis and Alice May Pettengell. Francis Pettengell was a school teacher, and government records (published in newspapers) show that he was appointed to a school in Burrier, on the Shoalhaven River, in 1890. In 1899, newspaper reports put the Pettengells in Bendemeer, in the New England region of New South Wales, where Violet attended Bendemeer Public School. Both Violet's parents died in Hornsby: Francis in 1943 and Alice in 1951.

Pettengell began publishing in the early 20th century: her earliest works appears in the Woman's Budget, a penny weekly periodical aimed at women readers, which included fashions, household advice, and both serial and short fiction. The Woman's Budget began in January 1906, and it is possible that Pettengell was a contributor from the beginning, although her earliest traced work is from March 1907. Later in 1907, she began contributing to the Evening News and then to the Sydney Mail: by this point, according to notes in the newspaper, she was living in Riverstone, in the Blacktown area.

(Biography in progress.)