Statistics for occurrence #1 of “Mrs. Mary J. Holmes” in chapter 7 of Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Book and heart: essays on literature and life:
...fessions recall the case of that New England bookseller in a small town who recently informed an inquirer that he had never heard of Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, but that he was probably the husband of Mrs. Mary J. Holmes , who wrote such lovely novels.
1896
...