Paulina Westdahl

Eleonora Polynetta (Pauline) Emilia Westdahl, (24 March 1810 - 7 August 1887) was a Swedish author and pioneer within the Swedish awakening movement.

Her father was the duke Polycarpus Cronhielm (1774-1810) and her mother Anna Margareta Maria Edenhielm. She had five siblings. From 1825 she resided in Jönköping and got married to a vicar named Carl Magnus Westdahl in 1835. The couple got six children. The Westdahls led the great awakning in the 1840 in Jönköping, they started the sobriety movements with Pauline Westdahl as manager for the bibelstudy group created by the United Bible Societies.

In 1848 her husband became the vicar of Karlshamn and Asarum. And after his death in 1865 Westdahl lived in Stockholm as a vicars widow with a yearly pension of 200 (SEK). To make a living she had to rent out rooms, and translated articles for and wrote for local newspapers. She released her first novel "Rosor och törnen in 1873 at the age of 63. Even though she earlier had published book on sobriety and the hurtful nature of the drink.