Mary Elizabeth Townsend
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Mary Elizabeth Townsend | |
|---|---|
| Born | 23 July 1841 Kilkenny, Ireland |
| Died | 14 June 1918 (aged 76) |
| Known for | Co-founder of the Girls' Friendly Society |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 0 |
| Parents |
|
| Relatives | William Rowan Hamilton (cousin) |
Mary Elizabeth Townsend (23 July 1841 – 14 June 1918) was a British philanthropist and co-founder of the Girls' Friendly Society.
Mary Elizabeth Butler was born in Kilkenny, then part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, into a family embedded in the Church of Ireland (i.e. not the Catholic Church). Her father Robert Butler was vicar of St John's Church in that city and chaplain to the Earl of Ormond. Her mother was Grace Hamilton, daughter of another minister, James Hamilton of Trim, County Meath. James ran a school, and took in and educated his nephew, Grace's cousin, and Mary's first cousin once removed, William Rowan Hamilton. William was a mathematical prodigy, who eventually became Royal Astronomer of Ireland.[1]
Mary's parents died when she was a young child and she was raised in England by her father's sisters.
Early philanthropy
Aged 21, she married an artist and botanist almost twice her age, Frederick Townsend (1823–1905), also of a clergy family. It was a happy and productive partnership; she put herself in his hands and was glad, as she put it, "to grow and develop under his care".[2] They lived at first at Shedfield Lodge near Wickham, Hampshire. (The building is now a care home.[3]) Both husband and wife worked at improving life for the people of the estate. Mary Townsend concentrated her efforts on the education of girls, the orphanage for girls, and the care of the ill and the old.
One of their visitors was Rev. Thomas Vincent Fosbery, chaplain to Samuel Wilberforce. Bishop of Winchester. The Bishop, impressed by her work with the girls and young women, invited her to develop an organisation on a larger scale, to tackle what was called in Victorian times the problem of "fallen women". Domestic service was by far the largest employer of women, and those who got pregnant out of wedlock faced losing not only their job but also their housing. Townsend decided to focus on prevention, by providing practical and moral support to what, a generation later, the Society's official historian called "working girls of unblemished character".[4]