Menie Parkes

Clarinda Sarah Parkes (23 July 1839 – 11 October 1915) was an Australian poet and writer. She was also known as Menie Parkes and wrote under that and a number of other pseudonyms, including Patty Parsley, Alethea, Ariel and C. S. P.

Menie Parkes
BornClarinda Sarah Parkes
(1839-07-23)23 July 1839
at sea, off Cape Howe, New South Wales, Australia
Died11 October 1915(1915-10-11) (aged 76)
Ashfield, New South Wales, Australia
Pen name
  • Patty Parsley
  • Alethea
  • Ariel
  • C. S. P.
RelativesSir Henry Parkes (father)

Biography

Parkes was the daughter of Clarinda (née Varney) and Henry Parkes, later five-time Premier of New South Wales. She was born on board the Strathfieldsaye, off the New South Wales coast, near Cape Howe.[1]

Her first poem appeared in print under her initials, C. S. P., in 1855 in the Empire,[2] a Sydney newspaper owned and edited by her father.[3] In 1859–1860, as Patty Parsley she wrote serialised stories for The Australian Home Companion and Band of Hope Journal.[4] Writing as Ariel, Bitter-Sweet–So Is the World was serialised over 30 weeks in The Sydney Mail in 1860–1861.[5]

On 30 March 1869 Parkes married William Thom, at Werrington.[6] He was a Presbyterian minister and they settled in Pambula, where their first two sons were born,[7][8] before moving to Ballan, near Ballarat in Victoria.

Parkes's last known published work was a reflection, Sydney Sixty Years Since, published in the Sydney Morning Herald in 1910.[9]

Death and legacy

Parkes died at her home in Ashfield, New South Wales on 11 October 1915.[1][10] She was buried in St Thomas' cemetery at Enfield.[11]

In 1983 A. W. Martin edited a collection of Thom's letters to her father, Letters from Menie : Sir Henry Parkes and his daughter.[12]

Works
  • Parkes, Menie (1866), Poems, Sydney: E. Cunninghame

References
  1. "Menie Parkes". The Institute of Australian Culture. 1 September 2012. Retrieved 11 August 2022.
  2. "The dream". The Empire. No. 1386. New South Wales, Australia. 19 June 1855. p. 5. Retrieved 12 August 2022 – via Trove.
  3. Martin, A. W. "Parkes, Sir Henry (1815–1896)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. ISSN 1833-7538. Retrieved 12 August 2022.
  4. "Chapters in Pet Perennials". cdhrdatasys.anu.edu.au. Retrieved 12 August 2022.
  5. "Chapters in Bitter-Sweet - So Is the World". cdhrdatasys.anu.edu.au. Retrieved 12 August 2022.
  6. "Family Notices". Empire. 7 April 1869. p. 1. Retrieved 12 August 2022 – via Trove.
  7. "Family Notices". Australian Town and Country Journal. 22 January 1870. p. 31. Retrieved 12 August 2022 – via Trove.
  8. "Family Notices". Evening News. 17 July 1871. p. 2. Retrieved 12 August 2022 – via Trove.
  9. "Sydney Sixty Years Since". The Sydney Morning Herald. 13 April 1910. p. 5. Retrieved 12 August 2022 – via Trove.
  10. "Personal: death of Mrs Clarinda Sarah Thom". The Northern Star. 19 October 1915. p. 4. Retrieved 22 October 2019 – via Trove.
  11. "Family Notices". The Daily Telegraph. 12 October 1915. p. 6. Retrieved 12 August 2022 – via Trove.
  12. Parkes, Menie (1983), Martin, A. W. (ed.), Letters from Menie : Sir Henry Parkes and his daughter, Melbourne University Press, ISBN 978-0-522-84222-7
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