Catherine Helen Spence

Catherine Helen Spence
Catherine Helen Spence (1825–1910) was an influential Australian author, social reformer, and advocate for women's rights and electoral reform. She is best known for her novel "Clara Morison" (1854), which provided a vivid portrayal of colonial life in South Australia. Spence was also a strong proponent of proportional representation and played a key role in advocating for this electoral reform in Australia. Additionally, she became the first female political candidate in Australia when she ran for the Federal Convention in 1897.

Author's Books:


CHAPTER I. Sitting down at the age of eighty-four to give an account of my life, I feel that it connects itself naturally with the growth and development of the province of South Australia, to which I came with my family in the year 1839, before it was quite three years old. But there is much truth in Wordsworth's line, "the child is father of the man," and no less is the mother of the... more...

Chapter I. In a large and handsomely-furnished room of a somewhat old-fashioned house, situated in a rural district in the south of Scotland, was assembled, one day in the early summer of 185-, a small group in deep mourning. Mr. Hogarth, of Cross Hall, had been taken suddenly ill a few days previously, and had never recovered consciousness so far as to be able to speak, though he had apparently known... more...