Louisa Lawson - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Louisa Lawson (17 February 1848 — 12 August 1920) was an Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

n writer, publisher, suffragist

Suffragette

"Suffragette" is a term coined by the Daily Mail newspaper as a derogatory label for members of the late 19th and early 20th century movement for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom, in particular members of the Women's Social and Political Union...

, and feminist. She was the mother of the poet and author Henry Lawson

Henry Lawson

Henry Lawson was an Australian writer and poet. Along with his contemporary Banjo Paterson, Lawson is among the best-known Australian poets and fiction writers of the colonial period and is often called Australia's "greatest writer"...

Early life

Louisa Lawson was born on 17 February 1848 at Guntawang Station near Gulgong, New South Wales

Gulgong, New South Wales

Gulgong is a 19th century gold rush town in the Central-West of the Australian state of New South Wales. The town is located about north west of Sydney, and about 30 km north of Mudgee along the Castlereagh Highway. At the 2006 census, Gulgong had a population of 1,907 people...

, the daughter of Henry Albury and Harriet Winn. She was the second of 12 children in a struggling family, and like many girls at that time left school at 13. On 7 July 1866 aged 18 she married Niels Larsen (Peter Lawson), a Norwegian sailor, at the Methodist parsonage at Mudgee, New South Wales

New South Wales

New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...

. He was often away gold mining or working with his father-in-law, leaving her on her own to raise four children — Henry 1867, Charles 1869, Peter 1873 and Gertrude 1877, the twin of Tegan who died at eight months. Louisa grieved over the loss of Tegan for many years and left the raising of her other children to the oldest child, Henry. This led to Henry having ill feelings towards his mother and the two fought constantly. In 1882 she and her children moved to Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

where she managed boarding houses.

Publisher

Lawson used the money saved while running her boarding houses to purchase shares in the radical pro-federation newspaper

Newspaper

A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...

The Republican in 1887. She and son Henry edited the Republican in 1887-88, which was printed on an old press in Louisa's cottage. The Republican called for an Australian republic

Republic

A republic is a form of government in which the people, or some significant portion of them, have supreme control over the government and where offices of state are elected or chosen by elected people. In modern times, a common simplified definition of a republic is a government where the head of...

uniting under 'the flag of a Federated Australia, the Great Republic of the Southern Seas'. The Republican was replaced by the Nationalist, but it lasted two issues.

With her earnings and her experience from working on The Republican, Lawson was able in May 1888, to edit and publish The Dawn
The Dawn (feminist magazine)
The Dawn: A Journal for Australian Women was the first feminist magazine published in Australia between 1888 and 1905. It was first published 15 May 1888 by Louisa Lawson using the pen name of Dora Falconer. The subtitle was later changed to A Journal for the Household.-History:Louisa Lawson left...

, Australia’s first journal produced solely by women which was distributed throughout Australia and overseas. The Dawn had a strong feminist perspective and frequently addressed issues such as women's right to vote and assume public office, women's education, women's economic and legal rights, domestic violence

Domestic violence

Domestic violence, also known as domestic abuse, spousal abuse, battering, family violence, and intimate partner violence , is broadly defined as a pattern of abusive behaviors by one or both partners in an intimate relationship such as marriage, dating, family, or cohabitation...

, and temperance

Temperance movement

A temperance movement is a social movement urging reduced use of alcoholic beverages. Temperance movements may criticize excessive alcohol use, promote complete abstinence , or pressure the government to enact anti-alcohol legislation or complete prohibition of alcohol.-Temperance movement by...

. The Dawn was published monthly for 17 years (1888–1905) and at its height employed 10 female staff. Lawson's son Henry also contributed poems and stories for the paper, and in 1894 The Dawn press printed Henry's first book, Short Stories in Prose and Verse.

Around 1904 Louisa published her own volume, Dert and Do, a simple story of 18,000 words. In 1905 she collected and published her own verses, The Lonely Crossing and other Poems. Louisa likely had a strong influence on her son's literary work in its earliest days.

Suffragist

In 1889 Lawson founded The Dawn Club, which became the hub of the suffrage movement in Sydney. In 1891 the New South Wales Women's Suffrage League formed to campaign for women's suffrage, and Lawson allowed the League to use the Dawn office to print pamphlets and literature free of charge. When women were finally given the vote, in 1902 with the passing of the New South Wales Womanhood Suffrage Bill, Lawson was introduced to the members of Parliament as 'The Mother of Suffrage in New South Wales'. For the women at the time universal suffrage

Universal suffrage

Universal suffrage consists of the extension of the right to vote to adult citizens as a whole, though it may also mean extending said right to minors and non-citizens...

was not the key issue, Lawson did not criticise the government for failing to give Indigenous Australians the vote.

Later life

Lawson retired in 1905 but continued to write for Sydney magazines and published The Lonely Crossing and Other Poems, a collection of 53 poems. She died on Thursday 12 August 1920 aged 72 after a long and painful illness in Gladesville Mental Hospital

Gladesville Mental Hospital

Gladesville Mental Hospital was a psychiatric hospital established in 1838 in the suburb of Gladesville, Sydney, Australia, its original name was Tarban Creek Lunatic Asylum.-Description and history:...

. On Saturday 14 August 1920, she was buried with her parents in the Church of England

Church of England

The Church of England is the officially established Christian church in England and the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The church considers itself within the tradition of Western Christianity and dates its formal establishment principally to the mission to England by St...

section of Rookwood Cemetery

Rookwood Cemetery

Rookwood Cemetery is the largest multicultural necropolis in the Southern Hemisphere, located in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia...

Memorials

In 1941, The Sydney Morning Herald reported a memorial seat would be erected in the The Domain, Sydney

The Domain, Sydney

The Domain is 34 hectares of open space in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. It is located on the eastern edge of the Sydney central business district, near Woolloomooloo. The Domain adjoins the Royal Botanic Gardens and is managed by the Royal Botanic Gardens Trust, a division of the New South...

as a tribute to Louisa Lawson.

In 1975 Australia Post

Australia Post

Australia Post is the trading name of the Australian Government-owned Australian Postal Corporation .-History:...

released a stamp in honour of Louisa.

Early life

Publisher

Suffragist

Later life

Memorials

See Also