Mary Gaunt - a Biography

Mary Gaunt - a biography Bronwen Hickman, BA (Melb.) 1980, Dip.Ed (Melb.) 1980 A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Communication, Language and Cultural Studies Department, Faculty of Arts, Victoria University of Technology. June 1998 FTS THESIS A823.2 SAU 30001005348828 Hickman, Bronwen, 1V^\ Mary Gaunt : a biography •% xy. Declaration It is hereby certified that: 1. The work is that of the candidate alone (except where due acknowledgement has been made) and has not been submitted previously, in whole or in part, in respect of any other academic award. 2. The content of the thesis is the result of work carried out since the official date of commencement of the program. (Bronwen Hickman) Abstract If a nation's story is told by the weaving together of the strands of individual lives, the biographies of its achievers, then the story of Mary Gaunt adds an important thread of colour and interest to the tapestry of Australia's identity. Born on the Victorian goldfields in 1861, she grew up in Colonial Victoria. She was the first woman to study at Melbourne University. She travelled in the forests of West Africa and across China and wrote books and gave lectures on her travels. She was a successful novelist; she pushed against the limitations of women's lives in her own life and in her fiction, and one of her books was banned in England as a result. She lived in Europe for the second half of her life, but remained proudly Australian; many of her books were set in Australia. Her depiction of life on the goldfields, in the bush, in shanty towns in the Colonies, and in particular her depiction of life for women, is a valuable record of a world long gone. Table of Contents Abstract Acknowledgements i List of maps iii List of Illustrations iii Chronology iv Introduction vii I. The Goldfields 1 II. A Colonial childhood 7 1H. A writing career 26 IV. Marriage and tragedy 40 V. London, and 'A dull and stony street' 58 VI. Africa-at last 73 VH. Fruitful years 87 VHI. A woman in China 97 DC. War ... and peace 113 X. The Bordighera years 121 XI. The storm and the silence 136 XH. Epilogue 143 Bibliography 145 This photograph of Mary Gaunt appeared in Alone in West Africa in 1912, when Mary was fifty-one. The date of the photograph is unknown. Acknowledgements I acknowledge with thanks the award of a postgraduate travelling scholarship by Victoria University which assisted me to travel to Italy, France and England in 1996 to do research for this book. I was in England for six weeks of research in November-December 1996. I was grateful for the help of staff members in the British Library Manuscripts Section, the Guildhall Library and India Office Library, London, and the William Salt Library in Stafford and the Local History Library in Liverpool. I award gold stars to Jill Crowther, of the Hull Central Library, for getting the Winifred Holtby letters to me just in time before I left England; and to Michael Bott, who found me useful papers in the Methuen and Macmillan archives and saved me a trip to Reading. I record my thanks to Paul Berry, for his permission to get access to the Winifred Holtby letters; to Miss Elsie Gladman, who nursed Mary Gaunt in her last years; to Margaret Ludlow, who I met in the Canterbury Records Office, and to Mr. Howard Rigney, who disregarded the pouring rain to help me find the last resting place of Elsie Lang and her family at Sittingbourne in Kent. In France I received kindness and help from Pamela and Neville Flower, who took me to the English Hospital and English Cemetery in Cannes; in Bordighera, Italy, I found many kind and courteous people: the staff at the Biblioteca Civica Internazionale (International Library) and the Istituto Internazionale di Studi Liguri (the Bicknell Institute); Signora Igina Bini at the Hotel Windsor Tennis; Awocato Moreno, who recalled the days of the English in Bordighera; and Sergio Biancheri, who found ways to open many doors, and whose introduction of me as 'our guest' I treasure. My thanks to the New York Public Library for copies of Mary Gaunt letters in the Century Collection; to the Wilson Library at the University of North Carolina for copies of Gaunt correspondence in the A.P.Watt archive; and to the Lockwood Library, State University of New York, Buffalo, for a Mary Gaunt letter. In Australia, I have spent many hours in the Public Record Office in Laverton, the Baillieu Library at Melbourne University, and the State Library of Victoria. I am indebted to their staffs for their patience and help. I have also been glad to gain access to Melbourne University Archives, the Burke Museum at Beechworth, the Wyndham City Library, the Mitchell i Library in Sydney, the National Library and the Australian Archives, Canberra. I thank the staff at Deakin University, Warrnambool - Jan Critchett, Jeanette Rhedding-Jones and Jennifer Bantow - for their welcome and their help. People and organisations have made their records available to me: Brian Woodyatt of the Ballarat Club; the Warrnambool Hospital; the Flagstaff Museum Warrnambool; Craig's Hotel, Ballarat, Mary Lugton, of the Baillieu Library, who must have been the first to gather together information about Mary Gaunt. Rex Fuge helped me with Chiltern records; David Perrin knew about Ballarat and the Gaunts; Helen Harris found me a William Gaunt letter, and Dudley Sheppard lent me his goldfields map. I am grateful to Ian McLaren, whose trail-blazing bibliography of Mary Gaunt has been of inestimable help to me, and who allowed me access to his working papers, which provided many promising leads. I have been grateful for expert medical advice from Professor Harold Attwood, Dr. Chris Buckley and Dr. Robert Hare, and to Harold Love for the tip-off that led me to the records of Lindsay Miller's death. I owe a great debt to members of the Gaunt, Palmer and Morrison families, who have been courteous, helpful and hospitable during my long quest. I remember with pleasure my meetings with Yvonne and Dick Fox, Michael Hemery, Jean Bowyer and her daughter Carol, Desmond and Kay Gaunt and Jill Marshall; I am also grateful to Libby Thomson and Geoff Palmer, whom I hope to meet one day, and to Don Webb, Janice Hilton and Alastair Morrison. My thanks also to Wilma Davies and Helen McCallum, who, although not members of these families, have been helpful sources of information on them. Some people are generous with help in wider spheres, and I remember with gratitude Paddy Morgan's advice and guidance which gave me several fruitful research paths to follow; and Rosaleen Love, whose patience and enthusiasm and interest and expertise have been a great help to me. It is no small thing to look back over three years of intensive work - over thirty years of interest and compiling - and remember so many kindnesses, so many wonderful people and experiences that I have known in the writing of this thesis. ii The only known picture of Elizabeth Gaunt William Henry Gaunt in the (nee Palmer), taken before her marriage to 1860s. William in 1860. Mary Gaunt, aged twelve, on the right, and her sister Lucy, aged eleven, on the left. Pictures on this page reproduced from Woman's Mazazine Annual, 1938, in which they appeared with Mary 'spart autobiography. Illustrations Portrait of Mary Gaunt facing page ii Mary's mother, Elizabeth Gaunt iii William Henry Gaunt iii Mary and her sister Lucy, aged 11 and 12 iii Illustration of 'Lost', story in English Illustrated Magazine 34 Finborough Road, London facing page 58 Mary's house in Finborough Road 58 Mary's house at 2 Brompton Square 58 'Mary Haven', New Eltham facing page 87 Frinsted Rectory and Church 87 Bordighera, the Bicknell Institute facing page 121 Bordighera, the English Library 121 Bordighera, the English Church 121 La Roseraie, Vence facing page 136 Sunny Bank Hospital, Cannes 136 Maps Victoria - the goldfields facing page 1 Mary Gaunt's sketch map of her travels around the Gold Coast facing page 73 Mary Gaunf s travels in China facing page 97 iii Chronology 20 Feb 1861 Mary born to William Henry and Elizabeth (nee Palmer) at Indigo, Chiltern, Vic. March 1865 Gaunt family moves to Beechworth. January 1869 After several moves, Gaunt family settles in Ballarat. 1876 Mary sits Matriculation - passes Latin, French, English, Arithmetic, Algebra, Euclid, History(well), Geography. 1881 Studies at Melbourne University. 1887 CasselTs Picturesque Australasia published. 7 Feb 1890 Sails for England. Overseas 1890-91 March 1894 Dave's Sweetheart published by Edward Arnold. 8 Aug 1894 Marries Dr. HX.Miller, widower, at StGeorge's Church of England, Glenferrie Road, Malvern. Sept 1895 The Moving Finger (short stories), Methuen & Co. August 1897 Kirkham's Find: Mary's most autobiographical novel. Sept 1898 Deadman 's, Methuen. Set in goldfields of north-eastern Victoria. 30 Oct 1900 Lindsay Miller dies at Kew. 15 March 1901 Mary sails for London via South Africa on Runic. Moves into Finborough Road. October 1904 The Arm of the Leopard: a West African Story, with John Ridgwell Essex, published by Grant Richards. 1905 Lives for several months in Sheffield. Nov 1906 Fools Rush In- a West African Story, with Essex, published by Heinemann. April 1908 First journey to Africa - down the coast from Sierra Leone to San Paul de Loando; Congo River, etc. Returns September. iv January 1909 The Silent Ones, with John Ridgewell Essex, published by T.Werner Laurie, London.

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