Mary Ellen (Thomas) Stewart (1868 - 1955)

Born 22 Dec 1868 in Sebastopol, Victoria (Australia)

Ancestors

Wife of Thomas Stewart — married 13 Aug 1888 in Lutwyche, Queensland (Australia)

Descendants

Died 12 Aug 1955 at age 86 in Kedron, Queensland, Australia

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Biography

Nellie (Thomas) Stewart was born in the Colony of Victoria (1851-1900)

Mary Ellen Thomas, or Nellie as she known to everyone, was born on 22nd December 1868 in Sebastopol, Victoria (Australia). She was the older surviving daughter of Welsh emigrants, Lodwick Thomas and Mary John. ^[1] She was christened in Sebastopol Congregationalist Church by Reverend David Davies.. In the early 1880s, Nellie and her family moved north to Queensland, immediately becoming active in the Lutwyche Methodist (now Uniting) Church. The move enabled her to meet for the first time her extended family of uncles, aunts and cousins.

Nellie married Scottish emigrant, Thomas Stewart, in 1888 in the Lutwyche Methodist Church. ^[2] The couple made their home initially nearby at Albion, where their six children were each born. Nellie lost both of her parents within two years of each other in the early 1890s. After 1904, the family moved to "Fairy Knolle", Roslyn Street, Coorparoo (East Brisbane). After The Great War, they settled back near Lutwyche and Albion, at Kedron. Kedron had first been settled by Nellie's older brother, John's parents-in-law, the Barron family. This latter home became part of the Kedron Private Hospital.

Nellie and Tom were active in the Wharf Street Congregational Church in Brisbane until it closed in 1925 and then in the City Congregational Church which grew out of it.

When not busy with family and church responsibilities, Nellie lived for her community, being elected president of the conservative Queensland Women's Electoral League. QWEL was founded in 1903 to address women's suffrage. Whilst apolitical, it was a conservative and anti-socialist organisation from the beginning. ^[3] Labor-oriented women who attended the QWEL launch left and formed the Women Workers' Political Organisation in opposition. In response to this political wrangling, The Women's Christian Temperance Organisation (yes, a third group with the same motives but with their special niche), called upon its own members to avoid 'the venom of party politics' and concentrate on the task at hand." ^[4]

Only two of Nellie and Tom's six children married, with only one, Tom, producing grandchildren. Four of their children pre-deceased Nellie; losing one to war, Arthur, one to an accident and two far too young to disease, Robina and George. Their youngest daughter, Alwyne, moved to Victoria with her doctor husband. Being left a widow for 15 years, Nellie's regular comfort towards the end came from an unmarried daughter, Gwenda, and her two grandchildren. Aged 86 years, Nellie passed away on 12th August 1955 at her home at Kedron, and is buried beside Tom in Lutwyche Cemetery, Kedron. ^[5]

Sources

1. ↑ Victoria Birth Index #5053/1868
2. ↑ Queensland Marriage Index #C1762/1888
3. ↑ Wikipedia: Queensland Women's Electoral League; accessed 7 May 2018
4. ↑ Australian Women's Register; accessed 7 May 2018
5. ↑ Queensland Death Index #9205/1955