Serendipitous Scholarship: Identifying the Author of Alone in the World (1866)

Turnbull Library Record, Volume 37, 1 January 2004, Page 59

Jenny Coleman

Serendipitous Scholarship: Identifying the Author of Alone in the World (1866)

Hunches, fanciful imaginings and a passionate over-identification with one’s research subject are scarcely the stuff of credible academic scholarship. But when the sources one has to work with are fragments of information, some of dubious historical veracity, fanciful imaginings may provide the key to unlocking the sequence of events that result in unanticipated discoveries. Under these circumstances, a passionate over-identification with one’s research subject can often provide the intrinsic motivation necessary for the tenacious piecing together of the fragments to reconstruct and narrate a life.

Housed in the New Zealand & Pacific Collection of the Alexander Turnbull Library is a small, green- leatherbound, gilt-edged fifty-six-page novel, published in 1866 by Mitchell and Seffern in Wyndham Street, Auckland. Titled Alone in the World: A Tale of New Zealand , its unnamed author is simply identified via ‘BY THE AUTHOR OF “THE HALF-CASTE WIFE,” &c, &c, &C.’ 1 This article offers an account of the serendipitous process that resulted in locating this book and identifying its author. This person was not famous in the conventional sense. There are no letters and manuscripts neatly deposited and catalogued for the historian to systematically work through. On the contrary, in this case, the sources available have been extremely fragmented and partial.

The only known review of Alone in the World appeared in the 19 May 1866 issue (p. 21) of The Penny Journal, a weekly newspaper also published by Mitchell and Seffem in Auckland. This review confirms that an earlier, shorter version of the work had been published in a serialised form in the Melbourne newspaper the Weekly Argus. 2 Its popularity with readers had encouraged the author to expand the work and publish it in book form.

Alone in the World (1866) Set in the province of Auckland, Alone in the World tells the story of an accomplished young woman named Miss Annie Barrington who, on the recent death of her mother, decides to become a governess for a family about to immigrate to New Zealand. The story centres on Annie’s efforts to locate her missing brother, who, by last known accounts, had been working on a farm close to Auckland. She engages the services of a wealthy settler (Mr Seaton) in attempting to find her brother and eventually marries Mr Seaton. There is a twist with the appearance of a woman who claims to be the wife of Mr Seaton but, after much mental suffering, this is proven to be a case of mistaken identity. The Penny Journal reviewer concludes that the novel presents a ‘very pleasing and well written story’ and notes that

The interest throughout is well sustained, the dialogue is fairly managed, and natural, the characters are drawn from the author’s point of view with skill, and the story throughout indicates the hand of an observant, fluent, rather cynical, but conscientious writer (21). The opening sentence of the review noted, ‘This book is evidently written by a lady.’ I have been able to identify that ‘observant, fluent, rather cynical, but conscientious’ lady as the teacher, writer and ardent women’s rights advocate Mary Ann Colclough (nee Barnes) (1836-1885). During the late 1860 s and early 1870 s she gained a high public profile in Auckland, initially through her articles and letters to the local newspapers written under her pen name ‘Polly Plum,’ and subsequently through her public advocacy for and lectures on women’s rights. Hailed as one of Auckland’s notorieties, and described as ‘our own little stray strap of a modem female fanatic’ (Foscari 3), she was considered in 1871 to be ‘the best abused woman in New Zealand in the present day’ (‘Editorial note to Readers and Correspondents’ 2).

I first read about Mary Ann Colclough in the article ‘What’s Wrong with Emma: The Feminist Debate in Colonial Auckland,’ by Judith Malone (nee Elphick), published in 1975. Mary Ann Colclough subsequently became one of three women researched in the early 1990 s for my doctorate on debates around the ‘Woman Question’ in nineteenth century New Zealand (Coleman 1996). Over the intervening years, as I have continued research toward a book on her life and writings, I have been tantalised by the gaps and silences in the records about a number of aspects of her life. Amongst these, I have been puzzled by some of the statements she made about her status as a writer and have been frustrated at not having been able to locate several publications she has referred to. For example, in June 1869, Polly Plum was publicly accused by newspaper letter-writer ‘Jemmy Jenkins’ of using others’ work as the basis for her articles published in the Daily Southern Cross. In his view, her writings amounted to merely ‘dishing up truisms in a new garb for our intelligent colonial public’ (Jenkins 5). These accusations resulted in a prolonged banter between Polly Plum and Jemmy Jenkins in the Letters to the Editor columns of the Daily Southern Cross. In response to his persistent criticisms, Polly Plum defended her

position as a writer who had been writing both for the English and for the colonial press for some time, clearly distinguishing this status from that of individuals who simply contributed anonymous letters to the newspapers from time to time. Her reply revealed a number of potential leads regarding publications. She wrote, Now, my writing may have very little merit; about that it does not become me to say one word; but the press have paid for them both in England and New Zealand, and latterly one or two pieces have been accepted and paid for in America. One editor in London spoke in very complimentary terms of the only long story I ever wrote, and several admitted my merit (Plum 22 July 1869:6).

To date, no examples of her work published in either London or the United States have been located. Mary Ann Colclough was a prolific contributor to the Auckland provincial press, regularly featuring in the Daily Southern Cross, the New Zealand Herald, the Thames Guardian and Mining Record, the Thames Advertiser, and the Weekly News from the late 1860 s until September 1872 when she left Auckland. She also had a serialised fictional work, ‘Effie’s Inheritance,’ published between May and December 1870 in the monthly religious journal the Christian Times (published by E. Wayte, Publishers, in Auckland). In June 1869 Mary Ann wrote of her intention to publish a volume of her essays, stating at the time that she had secured ‘the highest patronage’ for this forthcoming work, but again, there is no evidence that this publication eventuated (Plum 30 June 1869:4). Despite these various statements made in 1869 about the extent of her published work, the main body of her located newspaper journalism in New Zealand was published between 1869 and 1871.

Although not a newspaper columnist in the accepted sense of having her own regular column, Mary Ann Colclough was far more than simply another correspondent, albeit a prodigious one, to the Auckland newspapers. What marked her from anonymous newspaper writers was that she consistently signed her pen name to her work, be they letters to the editor, shorter pieces or serious articles. Between September 1868 and June 1871 she contributed about forty articles to the Daily Southern Cross and the Weekly News. During this period she also wrote about forty short opinion pieces, lighter in tone and usually a paragraph in length, covering a wide range of issues such as appearances and fashion, novels and music, various aspects of social customs and etiquette, and the like.

Research suggests that she began her career as a named newspaper columnist (as ‘Polly Plum’) in late 1869 when she was commissioned by the Daily Southern Cross to write a series of six articles on social topics. 3 Published during October and November of 1869, these articles were generally addressed to a female readership and covered topics such as what men should consider when choosing a wife, the preparation needed by girls to become wives, how to set up a home, how to make a happy fulfilling marriage, raising children, and guidelines for when girls and boys should enter society as adults. Polly Plum’s advice in these articles was generally

very conservative - one should avoid reckless extravagance, your first thought in marriage should be to love and study each other, forbearance in the marriage relation is the offspring and nourisher of love, girls should not enter society until they have a clear perception and knowledge of right and wrong. Occasionally she addressed more overtly political concerns, encouraging women to approach marriage and life in general with the forethought of being prepared to be self-reliant if necessary. Her need to be self-reliant featured as an impetus for much of her newspaper journalism. In 1867, at the age of 31, her husband had died and she had been left a widow with two children under the age of five to support. Throughout her marriage she had been the breadwinner, her husband having proven to be an incompetent provider. According to family sources, Thomas Colclough had been a remittance man. He had owned and rented properties in Melbourne before arriving in New Zealand in 1860, but, in marriage, had shown himself to be ‘not a bad, but a thoroughly unbusinesslike, unenergetic man [who] spent pounds and pounds of his wife’s earnings in profitless, and even in ruinous speculations’ (‘Answers to Jellaby Pater’ 3). Mary Ann Colclough’s primary source of income was from teaching, often supplemented with private music lessons. However her newspaper articles to the colonial press were also an important additional source of income, as she explained in a letter in June 1870:

I merely write down my thoughts on things as you write your leading articles - because it pays me to do so. My mission is to provide for my little fatherless children, and if I confined my attention solely to washing my dishes they would not often want washing, as there would seldom be food to put on them... Were I to act as I do from mere vanity, and neglect my duty, there would be wisdom in what you say; but not only I, but many women are perforce in a position in which it is our bounden duty to use such talents as we have to the best advantage. We have to buy our dishes as well as wash them (Plum 2 June 1870:3).

Alongside her articles and short pieces written for and paid for by the Daily Southern Cross, Mary Ann Colclough, like many other public-minded citizens, maintained regular correspondence to the Auckland newspapers on topical issues. More often than not, her letters were an extension of her articles on the position of woman and the circumstances of particular women who had come to her attention. Her letters and articles frequently engendered prolonged public debate and there were even occasions when members of the public wrote to the newspapers soliciting her views on particular issues.

One possible reason for the receptiveness shown by the Daily Southern Cross towards Mary Ann Colclough’s views may have been that the owner was known to be sympathetic to the cause of women’s rights. In 1869, the Daily Southern Cross was purchased by the journalist and politician Julius Vogel. Mary Ann Colclough did a significant amount of journalistic work for him and he is credited with suggesting the pen name ‘Polly Plum.’ Vogel intended the paper to be both a commercial success

and a political platform for his views. Known for his support for women’s right to education and suffrage, he looked forward to the time when women would be able to participate fully in public affairs. He aligned himself with John Stuart Mill’s theories regarding the female franchise, and in 1887 he introduced the (unsuccessful) Women’s Suffrage Bill to Parliament. Soon after he assumed ownership of the Daily Southern Cross the Stafford government fell, and, with William Pox now Premier, he was summoned to Wellington to take the post of Colonial Treasurer. Vogel continued as owner of the Daily Southern Cross until he was elected Premier in May 1873, at which time he sold his interests in the paper. Lor the intervening years, the Daily Southern Cross was under the control of an absentee owner.

Like Mary Ann Colclough, Julius Vogel used his literary abilities to address the cause of women. In 1889 he published a novel, Anno Domini 2000, or Woman’s Destiny, in which he used the vehicle of a prophetic romance to present his views on what women would have achieved by the year 2000. The novel tells the story of Hilda Richmond Litzherbert, a young New Zealand woman, and her love affair with the Emperor of ‘United Britain.’ ‘Britain’ has become the most powerful empire in the world and the former colonies are now united within it, against the rest of the world, in trade, defence and employment policies. Women have achieved full equality and are able to participate fully in every aspect of society, with two notable exceptions: the armed forces are still a male bastion; and the hereditary position of Emperor is still the birthright of the first-born male child.

A fortuitous find In 1998 I made contact with descendants of Mary Ann Colclough. Disappointingly, they confirmed that there was little in the way of primary source documents in the family’s possession that had been retained. There were a few photographs, as well as assorted birth, marriage and death certificates for several of Mary Ann Colclough’s immediate family members. There were also several envelopes providing addresses for the later years of her life, when she lived in Canterbury and taught in local schools. One of the few surviving pieces was a copy of a long handwritten letter she had sent to the Editor of the Evening Star some time between 1876 and 1878, describing general conditions of life in New Zealand. 4 The photographs were very exciting as up until that time there had been no known existing photograph of Mary Ann Colclough. 5 Most of what remained in the possession of family members related to her daughter Mary Louise Colclough (later, Wilson), who also became an accomplished journalist. 6 Amongst the latter category of items was a letter from Laura Bunting to Mrs Wilson, dated 15 January 1926, and printed on the letterhead of The Dominion. At first overlooked, this letter was to provide a major turning point in identification of Mary Ann Colclough’s publications. It read, Dear Mrs Wilson, I would like to thank you for the very interesting letter you sent me in regard to Mrs M.A. Colclough (Polly Plum) which was published in the

Dominion. We do not want to lose sight of any of our women who have done pioneering work in any form. We owe them too much to forget them. I am sorry that your name was omitted from the letter when published. It was away up at the side of the notepad and the printers overlooked it. Your friends would have been interested in knowing you had written it. Wasn’t Dulcie [sic] Cabot the first woman journalist? I hunted up some records that stated she was the first woman journalist to be attached to the staff of a newspaper. Mr Johannes Andersen of the Turnbull Library was speaking a little while ago of the works of Mrs Colclough and was very interested in your letter. I am forwarding a Dominion with the letter. Yours sincerely Laura Bunting

On the basis of this letter I envisaged the following scenario. Some time in late 1925, the Dominion had printed a piece on early women journalists. This had come to the attention of Mrs Mary Wilson, Mary Ann Colclough’s daughter, who subsequently wrote to the newspaper with information about her mother’s work. Her information had then been published as a follow-up to this original story, but the Dominion had failed to include Mrs Wilson’s name with the piece. This had resulted in Mrs Wilson having written to the newspaper again and it was the reply from Laura Bunting to this second letter that I had been given by her descendants. Several hours searching through microfilms in the newspaper section of the Turnbull soon confirmed that this sequence of events was, within a few minor details, accurate.

*The Inky Way’ On 5 December 1925, on page two of the magazine section of the Dominion, an article titled ‘The Inky Way: New Zealand Women Writers’ appeared, with the caption ‘Written for THE DOMINION by L.B.’ This was the Laura Bunting from the letter I held dated 26 January 1926. The article was a review of the women’s section of an exhibition showing in Dunedin of the work of contemporary New Zealand writers. It noted that Dolce Cabot (Mrs Duncan) was the first woman to hold a position on the staff of a New Zealand newspaper, and that she was a ‘keen feminist’ and ‘fought the good fight at any and all times for her fellow women, regardless of the heavy disapproval with which the movement was faced at that time’(L.B. 2). 7

The reply, which was printed a month later, was written from Geelong, in Victoria, Australia. This letter proved to be a mine of information. It stated that Mrs Colclough had been well known in literary circles since 1862, and that it was Julius Vogel, for whom she had done a great amount of journalistic work, who had suggested the pseudonym ‘Polly Plum.’ This supported a family story that Mrs Colclough had worked for Julius Vogel in some capacity. The letter also revealed that she had had

work published in the Australasian and some other papers in Australia. Of particular note, however, was the confirmation that Mrs Colclough had had several books published. The unnamed Mrs Mary Wilson (nee Colclough) wrote about One of her books I have read, ‘Alone in the World.’ The chief character in the book, Mrs De Costremonge was a very clever skit on the then budding social climber. Her other book, ‘The Half-Caste Wife,’ I did not read, but understand it caused some resentment, as there were many half-caste and Maori wives of Europeans in the sixties ('A Correspondent and an Omission’ 2).

On reading this letter it was with some trepidation that I turned to the main catalogue at the National Library to check if there was a record for either of these books. Within less than an hour, I was holding the small green-leather-bound copy of Alone in the World. The pages are very thin, very yellowed and disintegrating around some of the edges. The title page bears an inscription that I immediately recognised to be in the handwriting of Mary Ann Colclough. This copy of the book had evidently been presented to ‘Louisa Garnet [the surname is not easy to read] from her affectionate sister, the author of’ (followed by the printed title of the book), with ‘Auckland, NZ’ in handwriting underneath. Subsequent research at the Family Records Centre in London has confirmed that Mary Ann Colclough did have a younger sister named Louisa. There is no record of the publication of a book titled The Half-Caste Wife in New Zealand, Australia or England. The most likely explanation is that this was published in serialised form in one of the Australian newspapers but, unlike Alone in the World, was not then published separately in book form. Mrs Wilson’s comment that the story had caused some resentment would support this thesis, but further research is needed to confirm it.

New leads of information It is difficult to convey the intense sense of discovery at encountering all this fresh information. With the exception of family research carried out in London and Melbourne, a large part of my research into the life and writings of Mary Ann Colclough has been restricted to scrutinising newspaper sources and gleaning snippets of information from her writings that reveal aspects of her daily life. While these newspaper sources have been particularly rich with such details, the relative lack of archival sources has made the process of researching the life of this remarkable woman a slow process, though often serendipitous. The letter from Laura Bunting and the reply from Mary Ann Colclough’s daughter have opened up a myriad of new potential sources of information. For example, Johannes Andersen, the first librarian of the Alexander Turnbull Library, obviously had some knowledge of Mary Ann Colclough’s work. Might he have first encountered her during his schooling at Papanui School, where she had held a teaching position in the early 1880 s? The letter also confirms that she was well-known in literary circles in Auckland during the 1860 s. Are there any extant records of her involvement? The letter confirms a link with Henry Brett,

journalist for the Daily Southern Cross in the early 1860 s, and for the New Zealand Herald for five years, before he purchased Auckland’s Evening Star in 1870; yet it leaves open the question as to whether there is any record of Mary Ann Colclough’s work for Julius Vogel in his newspapers.

There are also unanswered questions surrounding the novel itself. Why did Mary Ann Colclough refer to Auckland as A throughout the text and to New Zealand simply as when this location was clearly identified in the subtitle of Alone in the Worldl Was this simply a stylistic convention of the time or did this represent some attempt to obscure the location of the novel? Why is its author identified only as ‘The author of “The Half-Caste Wife’”? Could this suggest that Mary Ann Colclough did not want to be personally associated with the novel? Was this related to the fact that ‘The Half-Caste Wife’ had not been well-received, and it was considered discreet to not publicly identify herself as the author of both? Or was there something in the novel itself that this anonymity was protecting? There are still many tantalising gaps, but identifying the previously unknown author of that small, green-leather-bound novel in the New Zealand & Pacific Collection in the Turnbull has opened a new chapter in the history of women’s fiction in New Zealand and has pieced together more of the puzzle of the chequered life of Mary Ann Colclough.

Works Cited Coleman, Jenny. ‘Philosophers in Petticoats: A Feminist Analysis of the Discursive Practices of Mary Taylor, Mary Ann Colclough and Ellen Ellis as Contributors to Debate on the “Woman Question” in New Zealand, 1845-1885.’ PhD Thesis, Feminist Studies Department, University of Canterbury, 1996. ‘Editorial note to Readers and Correspondents.’ Daily Southern Cross, 19 September 1871: 2. Foscari, Francis. ‘Letter to Editor.’ New Zealand Herald, 25 August 1871: 3. Jenkins, Jemmy. ‘Letter to Editor.’ Daily Southern Cross, 25 June 1869: 5. L.B. [Laura Bunting] ‘The Inky Way: New Zealand Women Writers.’ Dominion, 5 December 1925: Magazine Section: 2. ‘The Inky Way: A Correspondent and an Omission.’ Dominion, 2 January 1926: Magazine Section: 2. Malone, Judith. ‘What’s Wrong With Emma: The Feminist Debate in Colonial Auckland.’ New Zealand Journal of History, 1 9.2 (1975): 126-41. ‘Plum, Polly.’ ‘Answers to Jellaby Pater.’ New Zealand Herald, 18 August 1871:3. ‘Letter to Editor.’ Daily Southern Cross, 30 June 1869: 4. ‘Letter to Editor.’ Daily Southern Cross, 22 July 1869: 6. ‘Letter to Editor.’ Daily Southern Cross, 2 June 1870: 3. Review of ‘Alone in the World’, The Penny Journal, 19 May 1866: 21. Vogel, Sir Julius. Anno Domini 2000; or Woman s Destiny. London: Hutchinson & Co., 1889.

Endnotes 1 My sincere thanks go to Linda Evans, Philip Rainer, Clark Stiles and Peter Attwell of the Alexander Turnbull Library for their assistance in accessing a copy of Alone in the World, and also to John Ross for editorial comment and assistance. 2 Ample runs survive of the Argus, but relatively few surviving issues have been located of the Weekly Argus, which ceased publication in mid-1865, merging with other Melbourne papers, with the launch of the Australasian. Neither story can be found in Australian serial fiction indexes; and other enquiries in Australia have so far proved fruitless. Thanks are due to lan Morrison and other Australian librarians, who checked various resources, and especially to the librarians of the State Library of Victoria who checked available issues of the Weekly Argus. All that can presently be said is that the serialised form of the novel would have appeared at least a year before its publication in book form. Curiously, the novel is misdated as of 1886 in Lawrence Jones’s essay ‘The Novel’ in The Oxford History of New Zealand Literature in English, ed. Terry Sturm (Auckland, etc.: Oxford UP, 1991), p. 113; in the second edition (1998), p. 125. This is simply an error; there was no later edition of the novel.

3 The articles, subsequently reprinted in the Weekly News, were entitled: ‘Going-A-Courting’, ‘The School for Wives’, ‘Getting Married’, ‘Early Married Days’, ‘The Rising Generation’, and ‘Coming Out’. 4 Although the letter is undated, the address given of Ivy Lodge, South Town Belt, Christchurch, suggests it was probably written between 1876 and 1878 when she was living in Rangiora.

5 A photograph of Mary Ann Colclough has since been published. See Jenny Coleman, ‘Missionaries and Revolters: Exploring the Identities of Nineteenth Century Advocates of Women’s Rights.’ History Now, 6. 1 (2000): 8-12. 6 For a discussion of Mary Wilson’s journalism, see Jenny Coleman, ‘Like Mother, Like Daughter? Women Journalists and Generational Feminism in New Zealand.’ Womens Studies Association Conference Papers 2003, Wellington: Women’s Studies Association, 2004 (forthcoming). 7 For more information on Dolce Cabot, see entry in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, Volume 2, 1870-1900. Wellington: Bridget Williams Books/Department of Internal Affairs, 1993.