- Mary Barton – The eponymous character, a very beautiful girl.
- Mrs. Mary Barton – Mary's mother, who dies early on.
- John Barton – Mary's father, a millworker, an active member in trade unions.
- George Wilson – John Barton's best friend, a worker at John Carson's mill.
- Jane Wilson – George Wilson's wife, short-tempered.
- Jem Wilson – Son of George and Jane, an engineer and inventor who has loved Mary from his childhood.
- John Carson – Wealthy owner of a mill in Manchester.
- Harry Carson – Son of John Carson, attracted to Mary.
- Alice Wilson – George Wilson's sister, a pious old washerwoman, herbalist, sick-nurse.
- Margaret Jennings – Neighbour of Alice, blind, a sometime singer, a friend to Mary.
- Job Legh – Margaret's grandfather, a self-taught naturalist.
- Ben Sturgis – An old sailor, who looks after Mary during her stay in Liverpool.
- Will Wilson – Alice's nephew (Jem's cousin), whom she raised after the death of his parents. A sailor, he falls in love with Margaret.
- Esther (gives her name as Mrs. Fergusson of 145, Nicholas Street, Angel’s Meadow) – Sister of Mrs. Mary Barton, she is a fallen woman her function to pose an awful 'what if' concerning young Mary's fate.
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