The daughter of Francis W. Wilson (c. 1788 – 1858), a clerk, and his wife, Margaret Oliphant (c. 1789 – 17 September 1854), she was born at Wallyford, near Musselburgh, East Lothian, and spent her childhood at Lasswade (Midlothian), Glasgow and Liverpool. A street, Oliphant Gardens in Wallyford is named after her. As a girl, she constantly experimented with writing. In 1849 she had her first novel published: "Passages in the Life of Mrs. Margaret Maitland". This dealt with the Scottish Free Church movement, with which her parents had sympathised, and which had met with some success. It was followed by "Caleb Field" in 1851, the year in which she met the publisher William Blackwood in Edinburgh and was invited to contribute to "Blackwood's Magazine". The connection would last for her lifetime, during which she contributed well over 100 articles, including a critique of the character of Arthur Dimmesdale in Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter".