The daughter of Thomas Strickland and his wife Elizabeth (née Homer), Agnes was born in Rotherhithe, at that time in Surrey, where her father was employed as a manager of the Greenland Dock.

[1] Agnes' siblings were Elizabeth, Sarah, Jane Margaret, Catharine Parr Traill, Susanna Moodie (1803–1885), Thomas, and Samuel Strickland.

Agnes and her elder sister, Elizabeth, were educated by their father to a standard more usual for boys at that time.

Their biographical works are fine representations of the biographies written by Victorian women, many of which focused on female subjects and included aspects of social history such as dress, manners, and diet.

[3] Agnes' sisters Susanna Moodie and Catharine Parr Traill became particularly well known for their works about pioneer life in early Canada,[4] where they both emigrated with their husbands in 1832.