Mehalah:A Story of the Salt Marshesis set in the desolate marshlands of MerseaIsland and the surrounding area. On the lesser islet called Ray lives MehalahSharland with her sick mother struggling to make ends meet. One day, a new landowner, brute and rude man called Elijah Rebow, shows up claiming that he has bought the land and everything on it, informing Mehalah and her mother that they now owe their livelihood to him. He tries to bully Mehalah into submission, yet she openly defies him and insists upon self-sufficiency and independence. From that point starts Mehalah's struggle to win her freedom where everything is turned against her, but she doesn't give up a fight.

Sabine Baring-Gould (1834-1924) of Lew Trenchard in Devon, England, was an Anglican priest, hagiographer, antiquarian, novelist, folk song collector and eclectic scholar. His bibliography consists of more than 1240 publications, though this list continues to grow. One of his most important works is the 16 volume The Lives of the Saints. Baring-Gould organized the first scientific archaeological excavations of hut-circles on Dartmoor at Grimspound during 1893, and he wrote much about Dartmoor.