Edward Wollstonecraft was born to a London solicitor of the same name, the eldest brother of Mary Wollstonecraft. One of the reasons the young man sought to build a life away from England was to escape the notoriety which attached to his aunt, author of "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman". In 1812, while travelling from Lisbon to Cadiz, he met Alexander Berry, with whom he later formed a trading partnership, intending to operate in the colony of New South Wales. The two men shared lodgings in Cadiz while the city was under siege; they also lived together in London from 1815-1819, with Wollstonecraft's sister Elizabeth as part of their household; the couple eventually married.