Susan Agnes Macdonald (née Bernard), 1st Baroness Macdonald of Earnscliffe (August 24, 1836 – September 5, 1920) was the second wife of Sir John A. Macdonald, the first Prime Minister of Canada.
She was born near Spanish Town, Jamaica to The Hon. T.J. Bernard and his wife, Theodora Foulks. She was raised there and in England before she came to Canada with her mother to live with her brother, Hewitt, a lawyer and private secretary to political leader John A. Macdonald. It was through him that she met Macdonald for the first time in 1856. It was in 1866, in London, England, where Miss Bernard had been with her mother that she again met her husband to be who was there to prepare the British North America Act. They married on February 16, 1867, and had one daughter, Margaret Mary Theodora Macdonald, who was born severely handicapped, both mentally and physically (1869–1933).
On the first voyage of the transcontinental voyage of the Canadian railroad, Macdonald built Agnes a platform on the cowcatcher of the train and had a chair nailed to it so she could see the land united by the train. During her stay in Canada with her husband, she became intimately acquainted with many of the intricacies of the political and historical events of the country. After her husband's death in 1891 she was raised to the peerage in his honour as Baroness Macdonald of Earnscliffe, in the Province of Ontario and Dominion of Canada.[1][2]By 1896 she left her home at Earnscliffe to go back to England. Despite the weight of years, her participation in social and philanthropic work was active.[2]She died in England in September 1920, aged 84, and was buried in the Ocklynge Cemetery in Eastbourne, a town just south of London. The barony became extinct on her death.
| Honorary titles | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by None |
Spouse of the Prime Minister of Canada 1867–1873 |
Succeeded by Jane Sym Mackenzie |
| Preceded by Jane Sym Mackenzie |
Spouse of the Prime Minister of Canada 1878–1891 |
Succeeded by Mary Bethune, Lady Abbott |
| Peerage of the United Kingdom | ||
| New creation | Baroness Macdonald of Earnscliffe 1891 – 1920 |
Extinct |