Caroline Lee Whiting Hentz (1800–1856) was an American novelist whose literary career was defined by her active participation in the sectional debates of the antebellum United States. She is most noted for her public opposition to the abolitionist movement and her written defenses of the institution of slavery. Through her widely read fiction, Hentz became a prominent voice for Southern apologists during a period of intense national division.
Her most famous work, The Planter's Northern Bride, published in 1854, stands as a major example of the "anti-Tom" genre. This literary movement consisted of Southern writers producing novels in direct response to Harriet Beecher Stowe's bestselling anti-slavery book, Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852). Hentz's novel sought to counter Stowe's critique of slavery, presenting a defense of the plantation system to a national audience.
