By 1890, she had moved to New York, where she did freelance reporting for a number of newspapers. In 1893 she married the American Vice-Consul to Amoy, China, and was traveling in Korea when the Sino-Japanese War broke out. She used the opportunity to establish herself as a foreign correspondent for New York newspapers. During her time in Korea in June 1894, she wrote various reports about the attempted assassination of the Queen of Korea and the attack on the palace of seoul. She also began writing articles for popular magazines, eventually becoming editor of the Women's Dept. of "Peterson's Magazine". Hamm was also active in the National American Woman Suffrage Association and was sufficiently well known by 1895 that an article of that year in the "Boston Daily Globe" entitled "If Women were Members of Congress" included her as a potential candidate, along with Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.