Mary Braidwood Mowle's diary reveals the hidden world of colonial women
Mary Braidwood Mowle's diary is a rare account of colonial Australian women's everyday lives.
Mary arrived in Australia from England in 1836, age nine, educated in piano, languages, astronomy and drawing. Mary married at seventeen despite her father's suicide and bankruptcy, living in a bark hut with a dirt floor.
Mary died at thirty, after bearing six children. Mary's diary from 1850 to 1855 is one of very few surviving records in a woman's voice.
It documents daily life in colonial Australia. Most women of her era vanished from history without a trace.
A family member later cut out large sections. But what remains opens a window to experiences that shaped the nation.
Her words preserve a piece of Australian history that would otherwise have been lost.
- 1850 to 1855
- Diary span
- 1836, age nine
- Arrival and age
- 13,000 acres
- Property in Braidwood
- Died at thirty after bearing six children
- Life span and children
Why it mattersWithout women's own accounts of their lives, colonial history reads as a story told only by men. Mowle's diary restores balance to how we understand the period.
AustraliaAustralian historians and students studying colonial history gain rare insight into women's experiences, perspectives and struggles in the nation's founding decades.
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