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Mary Elizabeth Windeyer
editMary Elizabeth Windeyer (1837-1912) Australian women's rights campaigner[1], known for her close relationship to charitable works and philanthropic movements in Sydney. Mary was the second daughter of eleven children of Rev. Robert Thorley Bolton, a clergyman of the Church of England, and his wife Jane Martha, née Ball.
Early life
editMary was baptised on 2 April 1837 at Buxted, Sussex, England, and two years later on the 25 July 1839 her family came to Australia. Mary spent her childhood at Hexham where she married (Sir) William Charles Windeyer on 31 December 1857. Between 1859 and 1876 nine children were born of the marriage, the third daughter dying in infancy. During bouts of ill health Mary took her children to stay with her mother-in-law at Tomago. Both women were devout; both offered William political advice.[2]
Career
editInitially directing her philanthropy towards saving infant life, in 1874 Mary supported a foundling hospital—to 'remove temptation to infanticide'—and its reorganisation in 1875 as a home (later Infants' Home, Ashfield) for destitute and homeless new mothers, provided they remained in residence to breastfeed their babies.
Lady Windeyer was one of the founders of the Crown Street Women's Hospital, she proposed a women's hospital in 1893 with the purpose to train nurses and assist the poor. [3]
References
edit- ^ Radi, Heather. "Lady Mary Elizabeth Windeyer". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
- ^ Radi, Heather. "Lady Mary Elizabeth Windeyer,". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography. Retrieved 8 September 2016.
- ^ Radi, Heather. "Lady Mary Elizabeth Windeyer". National Centre of Biography, Australian National University: Australian Dictionary of Biography.