Helena Wells, later Whitford (1761?–1824) was an American novelist and writer at the end of the eighteenth century.
The title page of The Stepmother describes her as living in Charleston, South Carolina; she "seems to have been a Loyalist who later served as a governess in London".
[1] Robert became a successful bookbinder, bookseller, and then a printer for The South-Carolina and American General Gazette in 1758.
According to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (ODNB), Wells ran a school in London with her sister from 1789 to 1799, and the subject-matter of Letters on Subjects of Importance to the Happiness of Young Females suggests a switch of career to that of governess.
In Thoughts and Remarks on Establishing an Institution, for the Support and Education of Unportioned Respectable Females (1809) Helena Wells wrote, "It was in the prime of my life (past thirty), that I attempted to place myself at the head of an establishment to board and educate Young Ladies."