Medley, Mary: Papers

Fonds — Box: Quarto MSS N3c, envelope(s): MSS M491

Identifier: medm

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

Accounts of two journeys made in 1853 to Otaki, and in 1854 to Auckland, recounted in later life. Leaves embossed with official Government House seal and written on both sides (J.C. Beaglehole Room Card Catalogue entry)

Dates

Creation: 1853 - 1854

Access and use

Access is freely available in the J.C.Beaglehole Room for research and private study. For any use beyond this, please contact the J.C.Beaglehole Room (jcbeaglehole.room@vuw.ac.nz) in the first instance.

Biographical information

Mary Medley was born in 1835 in Ely, Cambridgeshire, England, the daughter of Rev Richard Taylor and Mary Caroline Taylor. She came to New Zealand with her parents in 1839. In 1863 she married Lieutenant Spencer Mansel Medley, RN, who served as an aide-de-camp to Governor Grey. In 1865, the couple returned to England, but later came back to New Zealand. They had one daughter, Adela. In her later years, Mary Medley was involved in the suffragette and temperance movements, as well as in the interests of Maori women. She was an an amateur artist and many of her drawings and other papers are held at the Alexander Turnbull Library. She died in 1922 and is buried, with her husband and daughter, in Karori Cemetery.