{{Short description|English writer (1824–1885)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} {{Infobox Writer | name = Mary Hume Rothery | image = | imagesize = | caption = | pseudonym = | birth_date = 14 December 1824 | birth_place = [[London]] | death_date = {{death-date and age|14 February 1885|14 December 1824}} | death_place = [[Cheltenham]] | occupation = | nationality = [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland]] | period = | genre = | subject = | movement = | debut_works = | influences = | influenced = | signature = | website = | footnotes = | module = {{infobox person | embed = yes | spouse = {{marriage|Rev. William Rothery|9 July 1864}} | father = [[Joseph Hume]] | mother = Mary Burnley | relatives = [[Allan Octavian Hume]] (brother)<br>{{nowrap|[[William Hume-Rothery]] (grandson)}} }} }}
'''Mary Hume Rothery''' or '''Mary Catherine Hume-Rothery''' (14 December 1824 – 14 February 1885) was a [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|British]] writer and campaigner for medical reform. She campaigned against the [[Contagious Diseases Act]] and founded the National Anti Compulsory Vaccination League.
==Early life== Rothery was born in [[London]] in 1824. Her parents were Mary Burnley, daughter of Hardin Burnley (1741–1823), and [[Joseph Hume]] the radical politician: she was their youngest daughter and [[Allan Octavian Hume]] was her brother.<ref>{{Cite journal|date=1969-11-30|title=William Hume-Rothery, 1899-1968|journal=Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society|language=en|volume=15|pages=109–139|doi=10.1098/rsbm.1969.0006|s2cid=72451114|issn=0080-4606|last1=Raynor|first1=Geoffrey Vincent|doi-access=free}}</ref> She travelled on the continent of Europe with her father, and wrote poetry and biblical exposition.<ref name="Obit">{{cite news |title=Death of Mrs. Hume-Rothery |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0003164/18850228/054/0004 |work=Middleton Albion |date=28 February 1885|page=4}}</ref>
==Married life== Mary married the Rev. William Rothery on 9 July 1864, in two London ceremonies: firstly by [[John Frederick Blake]] at St Mary, Bryanston Square; and then at the New Church, Argyll Square, by Jonathan Bayley.<ref>{{cite news |title=Married |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0001108/18640716/033/0003 |work=Glossop Record |date=16 July 1864|page=3}}</ref> William's father John Rothery lived at [[Great Clifton]].<ref>{{cite book |title=The Intellectual repository for the New Church. (July/Sept. 1817). [Continued as] The Intellectual repository and New Jerusalem magazine. Enlarged ser., vol.1-28 |date=1864 |publisher=General Conference of the New Church |page=390 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BFQEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA390 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Marriages |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0002281/18580114/048/0003 |work=Soulby's Ulverston Advertiser and General Intelligencer - Thursday |date=14 January 1858|page=3}}</ref> He had studied at [[St Bees Theological College]], from 1846, and was ordained deacon in 1848, and a priest of the [[Church of England]] in 1849, by [[James Prince Lee]], [[Bishop of Manchester]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=St Bees College |title=The St. Bees College Calendar |date=1853 |page=44 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Qt8NAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA44 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Ordinations |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0001945/18490609/034/0007 |work=John Bull |date=9 June 1849|page=7}}</ref><ref name="Crockford">{{cite book |title=Crockford's Clerical Directory |date=1874 |page=447 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AQQFAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA447 |language=en}}</ref> William and Mary had a shared interest in poetry.<ref name="Raynor">{{cite journal |last1=Raynor |first1=G. V. |title=William Hume-Rothery. 1899-1968 |journal=Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society |date=1969 |volume=15 |pages=109–139 |doi=10.1098/rsbm.1969.0006 |jstor=769299 |s2cid=72451114 |issn=0080-4606|doi-access=free }}</ref> After a number of curacies and incumbencies, William Rothery's last preferment in the Church of England was as curate of [[Hexham]], 1862–4.<ref name="Crockford"/> Testimonial gifts were made to him by the former churchwardens of the Abbey Church there, in June 1864.<ref>{{cite book |title=The Intellectual repository for the New Church. (July/Sept. 1817). [Continued as] The Intellectual repository and New Jerusalem magazine. Enlarged ser., vol.1-28 |date=1864 |publisher=General Conference of the New Church |pages=389–390 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BFQEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA389 |language=en}}</ref> At the end of 1864 he became pastor of the Middleton Society of the [[The New Church (Swedenborgian)|New Church]], at [[Middleton, Greater Manchester|Middleton]] near Manchester.<ref name="OW">{{cite web |last1=Odhner |first1=C. Th. and William Whitehead |title=Annals of the New Church|date=1904|volume=II: 1851-1890|page=84 |url=https://newchristianbiblestudy.org/bundles/ncbsw/on-deck/english/books/Annals%20of%20the%20New%20Church%201851-1890.html |website=newchristianbiblestudy.org}}</ref>
In 1865 William published a pamphlet ''Wheat and Tares''.<ref name="Crockford"/> He preached in Middleton at the New Jerusalem Church, Wood Street. He was not long there. He then moved to a room in the Middleton Baths; and subsequently was found a chapel on Manchester Old Road. Mary gave lectures there; William was sometimes ill, and she preached in his place.<ref name="Obit"/>
The couple adopted the name Hume-Rothery in 1866. They later moved to south-west England.<ref name=ooo/> This was at some point in the early 1870s. In ''Crockford's Clerical Directory'' for 1874, William's address is given as Merton Lodge, Tivoli, [[Cheltenham]].<ref name="Crockford"/>
==Activism== [[File:Mary Hume Rothery.jpg|thumb|Publication in 1880]] Mary Hume-Rothery called for [[universal suffrage]] in April 1867, in the ''[[Manchester Examiner and Times]]''. She put more emphasis on principle than [[Lydia Becker]], also in the Manchester area, and other more incremental campaigners.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Holton |first1=Sandra |last2=Purvis |first2=Dr June |last3=Purvis |first3=June |title=Votes For Women |date=4 January 2002 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-134-61065-5 |pages=64 and 77|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TlmGAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA64 |language=en}}</ref> She was a leading figure in the [[Ladies National Association for the Repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts]] (LNA) set up in 1869. She was one of the prominent leaders in the LNA's campaign against the [[Contagious Diseases Acts]] of 1864, with [[Josephine Butler]], [[Harriet Martineau]] and Sarah Richardson.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Porter |first1=Dorothy |title=Health, Civilization and the State: A History of Public Health from Ancient to Modern Times |date=10 August 2005 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-134-63718-8 |page=133 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=F5eEAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA133 |language=en}}</ref> She was a prominent invited speaker for the LNA.<ref name=ooo/><ref name="Walkowitz">{{cite book |last1=Walkowitz |first1=Judith R. |title=Prostitution and Victorian Society: Women, Class, and the State |date=29 October 1982 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-27064-9 |page=128 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3wbfmH9L9qoC&pg=PA128 |language=en}}</ref>
Mary published in 1870 ''A Letter Addressed to the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone''.<ref name=ooo>{{Cite ODNB|title=Rothery, Mary Catherine Hume- (1824–1885), campaigner for medical reform and author|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-49483|year = 2004|language=en|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/49483|access-date=2020-05-28}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Hume-Rothery |first1=Mrs |title=A Letter addressed to the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, and the other members of Her Majesty's Government ... touching the Contagious Diseases' Acts of 1866 and 1869, etc |date=1870 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YSNeAAAAcAAJ |language=en}}</ref> This open letter questioned the line drawn between conventional marriage and prostitution.<ref name="Walkowitz"/> In June of that year, the Anti-Vaccination League held its first meeting, in Manchester and presided over by [[Francis William Newman]], author of ''Vaccination Considered Politically'' (1869). It decided to petition parliament against the Vaccination Acts.<ref>{{cite news |title=This Morning's Intelligence: Home |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0001652/18700629/028/0006 |work=Globe |date=29 June 1870|page=6}}</ref> In December William Hume-Rothery wrote, from 3 Richmond Terrace, Middleton, an extended letter in support of the Anti-Vaccination Society to the editor of the ''Cosmopolitan'', referring to coverage in [[The Globe (London newspaper)|''The Globe'']] and an earlier letter of his from 1869.<ref>{{cite news |title=The Globe Newspaper on the Anti-Vaccination Society |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0004190/18701229/049/0011 |work=Cosmopolitan |date=29 December 1870|page=6}}</ref>
In 1871 Mary Hume-Rothery published ''Women and Doctors; Or, Medical Despotism in England''. Its message was to resist government control that discriminated against medicine that was not from trained doctors.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=phI5xQEACAAJ|title=Women and Doctors; Or, Medical Despotism in England|date=1871|publisher=A. Heywood.|language=en}}</ref> Her mentor, Tulk, was an enthusiast for [[phrenology]] and [[mesmerism]].<ref name=ooo/> She campaigned against male involvement in [[internal examination]]s of women; she objected also to men becoming midwives. Her attitude was that male doctors had assisted with the Contagious Diseases Act, that blamed prostitutes for the spread of sexual disease.<ref name=p121>{{Cite book|last=Kent|first=Susan Kingsley|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5Pb_AwAAQBAJ&q=mary+hume+rothery&pg=PA121|title=Sex and Suffrage in Britain, 1860-1914|date=2014-07-14|publisher=Princeton University Press|page=121|isbn=978-1-4008-5863-7|language=en}}</ref> She attributed her own conversion to anti-vaccination to seeing her own child vaccinated, around 1867.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Summers |first1=Anne |title="The Constitution Violated": The Female Body and the Female Subject in the Campaigns of Josephine Butler |journal=History Workshop Journal |date=1999 |volume=48 |issue=48 |page=12 |doi=10.1093/hwj/1999.48.1 |jstor=4289632 |pmid=21351675 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4289632 |issn=1363-3554|url-access=subscription }}</ref>
In 1874 Mary and William founded the ''National Anti Compulsory Vaccination League'' (NACVL). William led the [[anti-vaccination]] organisation and Mary was the secretary. For some years Cheltenham became the centre of the national movement opposing vaccination, and Mary edited its magazine.<ref name="Durbach">{{Cite book|last=Durbach|first=Nadja|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TtMDl7n8iq8C&q=Mary+Hume-Rothery&pg=PA38|title=Bodily Matters: The Anti-Vaccination Movement in England, 1853–1907|date=2005|publisher=Duke University Press|isbn=978-0-8223-3423-1|language=en}}</ref> In [[Keighley]], Poor Law Guardians were imprisoned, following resistance tactics against vaccination advocated by William.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Porter |first1=Dorothy |last2=Porter |first2=Roy |title=The politics of prevention: Anti-vaccinationism and public health in nineteenth-century England |journal=Medical History |date=July 1988 |volume=32 |issue=3 |page=235 |doi=10.1017/s0025727300048225|pmid=3063903 |pmc=1139881 }}</ref> A short notice in the ''[[British Medical Journal]]'' in 1876 mentioned "the efficacy and value of vaccination" and the need for evidence to counterbalance "such irrational and dangerous agitators as Stevens and Hume Rothery."<ref>{{cite journal |title=Letters, Notes, And Answers To Correspondents |journal=The British Medical Journal |date=1876 |volume=2 |issue=832 |page=774 |jstor=25243499 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25243499 |issn=0007-1447}}</ref>
==Last years== In 1876 William gave up his religious orders.<ref name="Durbach"/> Ultimately, the Hume-Rotherys were less effective campaigners than William Young the chemist, allied to [[William Tebb]] and William White, who were more interested in their working-class base, and would pay fines imposed by those refusing vaccination.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Durbach |first1=Nadja |title=Bodily Matters: The Anti-Vaccination Movement in England, 1853–1907 |date=2005 |publisher=Duke University Press |isbn=978-0-8223-3423-1 |pages=39–40 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TtMDl7n8iq8C&pg=PA39 |language=en}}</ref> The Hume-Rotherys had an advocate in the Member of Parliament [[Peter Alfred Taylor]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=McHugh |first1=Paul |title=Prostitution and Victorian Social Reform |date=26 June 2013 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-136-24775-0 |page=250 |language=en}}</ref> In 1881 the ''British Medical Journal'' complained that a letter on vaccination by Taylor to [[William Benjamin Carpenter]] was offensive, and a pamphlet of his "might have been written by Messrs. Hume-Rothery, Baker, Wheeler or Gibbs."<ref>{{cite journal |title=Antivaccination Advocates |journal=The British Medical Journal |date=1881 |volume=2 |issue=1085 |page=636 |jstor=25257971 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25257971 |issn=0007-1447}}</ref> The NACVL was eclipsed by the [[London Society for the Abolition of Compulsory Vaccination]] in the 1880s.<ref name=ooo/>
Mary Hume-Rothery died in Cheltenham in 1885, and William died in 1888.<ref name=ooo/>
==Works== Mary published a biography of [[Charles Augustus Tulk]], and explanation of his ideas, in 1850. Tulk was a friend of her father's who had persuaded her to become a [[Swedenborgian]]. He was not a member of this [[The New Church (Swedenborgian)|New Church]], but his writings on the church founder's ideas about the "law of correspondence" were addressed to the church members.<ref name=ooo/> Her husband by 1864 was described as a New Church pastor.<ref name="OW"/> But his ''Wheat and Tares'' of the following year was not well received by the New Church, being criticised in 1866 as "Tulkism" (effectively, heretical).<ref>{{cite web |last1=Odhner |first1=C. Th. and William Whitehead |title=Annals of the New Church|date=1904|volume=II: 1851-1890|page=93 |url=https://newchristianbiblestudy.org/bundles/ncbsw/on-deck/english/books/Annals%20of%20the%20New%20Church%201851-1890.html |website=newchristianbiblestudy.org}}</ref>
Other works by Mary reflect her Swedenborgian views.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Larsen |first1=Robin |last2=Larsen |first2=Stephen |last3=Lawrence |first3=James F. |title=Emanuel Swedenborg: A Continuing Vision : a Pictorial Biography & Anthology of Essays & Poetry |date=1988 |publisher=Swedenborg Foundation |isbn=978-0-87785-136-3 |page=266 |language=en}}</ref> Before her marriage there were:
*''The Bridesmaid, Count Stephen, and Other Poems'' (1853)<ref>{{cite book |last1=Rothery |first1=Mary Catherine Hume- |title=The Bridesmaid, Count Stephen, and Other Poems |date=1853 |publisher=J. Chapman |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JQBMAAAAYAAJ |language=en}}</ref> *''The Wedding Guests, Or, The Happiness of Life'' (1857), novel.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hume |first1=Mary Catherine |title=The Wedding Guests, Or, The Happiness of Life |date=1857 |publisher=John W. Parker and Son |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RXVJHAAACAAJ |language=en}}</ref> *''Normiton: A Dramatic Poem in Two Parts'' (1857)<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hume |first1=Mary Catherine |title=Normiton: A Dramatic Poem in Two Parts. With Other Miscellaneous Pieces |date=1857 |publisher=John W. Parker and Son |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HrwVAAAAYAAJ |language=en}}</ref> *''The Golden Rule: And Other Stories for Children'' (1860)<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hume |first1=Mary Catherine |title=The Golden Rule: And Other Stories for Children |date=1860 |publisher=F. Pitman |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QqOPswEACAAJ |language=en}}</ref> *''Twelve Obscure Texts of Scripture Illustrated according to the Spiritual Sense'' (1861).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hume |first1=Mary C. |title=Twelve Obscure Texts of Scripture Illustrated according to the Spiritual Sense |date=1861 |publisher=G. Manwaring |location=London |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=x-JUAAAAcAAJ |language=en}}</ref> The phrase from [[Emanuel Swedenborg]], "love itself and wisdom itself",<ref>{{cite book |last1=Swedenborg |first1=Emanuel |title=The Swedenborg Concordance: A Complete Work of Reference to the Theological Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg. Based on the Original Latin Writings of the Author |date=1890 |publisher=Swedenborg Society |page=240 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xkdNAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA240 |language=en}}</ref> occurs on p. 57 of this work, as it does on p. 1 of William's ''Wheat and Tares''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Rothery |first1=Rev William Hume |title=Wheat and Tares; or, Christianity versus Orthodoxy |date=1865 |publisher=F. Pitman |page=1 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dljTfmI4EIgC&pg=PA1 |language=en}}</ref> *''Sappho: a Poem'' (1862)<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hume |first1=Mary Catherine |title=Sappho: a Poem |date=1862 |publisher=F. Pitman |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Tqp1tgEACAAJ |language=en}}</ref> It has been considered a feminist analysis of prostitution.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Bristow |first1=Joseph |title=The Cambridge Companion to Victorian Poetry |date=26 October 2000 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-64680-2 |page=196 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iSQoVCT_6QQC&pg=PA196 |language=en}}</ref>
[[Bessie Rayner Parkes]], daughter of [[Joseph Parkes]] the Radical Member of Parliament, tried in 1853 to have Marian Evans ([[George Eliot]]) notice Mary's poems for the ''[[Westminster Review]]''. But she declined, saying "she had not courage to proceed" from a first sample.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=McCormack |first1=Kathleen |title=Bessie Parkes's "Summer Sketches:" George Eliot as Poetic Persona |journal=Victorian Poetry |date=2004 |volume=42 |issue=3 |page=303 |jstor=40002773 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40002773 |issn=0042-5206}}</ref>
''The Divine Unity, Trinity, and At-one-ment: A Monograph'' (1878)<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hume-Rothery |first1=William |last2=Hume-Rothery |first2=Mary |title=The Divine Unity, Trinity, and At-one-ment: A Monograph |date=1878 |publisher=Abel Heywood & Son |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6MpAMwEACAAJ |language=en}}</ref> was a joint work by William and Mary Hume-Rothery. It was again considered by a reviewer to represent the approach of Tulk.<ref>{{cite book |title=The Intellectual repository for the New Church. (July/Sept. 1817). [Continued as] The Intellectual repository and New Jerusalem magazine. Enlarged ser., vol.1-28 |date=1878 |publisher=General Conference of the New Church |page=232 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wUMEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA232 |language=en}}</ref> A second edition of Mary's work on Tulk was published in 1890 as ''A Brief Sketch of the Life, Character, and Religious Opinions of Charles Augustus Tulk'' by Charles Pooley (1817–1890), a surgeon living in Cheltenham, who added "a short introductory chapter or historical outline of the author's life". He had in 1889 published ''The Science of Correspondency and Other Spiritual Doctrines of Holy Scripture'' by Tulk, as editor.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hume |first1=Mary Catherine |last2=Pooley |first2=Charles |title=A Brief Sketch of the Life, Character, and Religious Opinions of Charles Augustus Tulk |date=1890 |publisher=J. Speirs |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Y218mAEACAAJ |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Pooley, Charles (1817 - 1890) |url=https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/lives/search/detailnonmodal/ent:$002f$002fSD_ASSET$002f0$002fSD_ASSET:375156/one?qu=%22rcs%3A+E002973%22&rt=false%7C%7C%7CIDENTIFIER%7C%7C%7CResource+Identifier |website=livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Tulk |first1=Charles Augustus |title=The Science of Correspondency and Other Spiritual Doctrines of Holy Scripture ... Edited by C. Pooley |date=1889 |publisher=J. Speirs |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=e_vbMgEACAAJ |language=en}}</ref>
==Family== William and Mary's son Joseph Hume Hume-Rothery was born in 1866, and was the father of [[William Hume-Rothery]].<ref name="Raynor"/>
==References== {{reflist}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hume-Rothery, Mary}} [[Category:1824 births]] [[Category:1885 deaths]] [[Category:British anti-vaccination activists]] [[Category:Writers from London]] [[Category:19th-century English non-fiction writers]] [[Category:19th-century English women writers]] [[Category:English women non-fiction writers]]