Sarah Atkinson

Sarah (née Gaynor) Atkinson (23 October 1823 – 8 July 1893) was an Irish writer, biographer, essayist and philanthropist.

Biography

She was the eldest daughter of John and Anne Gaynor, of Athlone, County Roscommon. At the age of fifteen she moved with her family to Dublin. At twenty-five, she married the much older George Atkinson, a medical doctor and joint proprietor of the Freeman's Journal. They were both interested in art and Sarah accompanied her husband on many trips abroad, taking in the cultural centres of Europe. At home they made the acquaintance of prominent politicians, journalists and musicians. Regular guests at their house were Dr. John Shaw, editor of the Evening Mail, Rosa Mulholland and Katherine Tynan.[1]

The loss of her only child in his fourth year deeply affected Mrs. Atkinson and she threw herself into charitable and other good works. She moved with her husband to Drumcondra in Dublin, where she made the acqaintance of Mrs. Ellen Woodlock, a widow who had spent many years abroad. With her she interested herself in the female paupers of the South Dublin Union, and opened a better home to which many were transferred. She campaigned for years to improve the state of the workhouses and provide better conditions for the poverty-stricken. She visited hospitals and prisons, in the 1880s accompanying Katherine Tynan to visit the last of the Land Leaguers incarcerated in Kilmainham Gaol.[2]

From the 1850s Atkinson contributed a large number of historical and biographical articles and essays to several publications, including the Hibernian Magazin, The Month, The Nation and the Freeman's Journal. She later wrote for the Irish Monthly after it was established, and for the Irish Quarterly Review. Her Life of Mary Aikenhead was published in 1875 and was very well received. She followed this with biographies of the Irish sculptors John Henry Foley and John Hogan and also a life of Catherine of Siena. A collection of her essays wase published posthumously in 1895.[3]

References

  1. ^ Woodnut, K (Sep., 1967). "Sarah Atkinson as a Social Worker". Dublin Historical Record (Old Dublin Society) 21 (4): 132–133. JSTOR 30103878. 
  2. ^ Katherine Tynan, Memoirs, p. 108
  3. ^ Seamus Deane, Angela Bourke, Andrew Carpenter, Jonathan Williams. The Field day anthology of Irish writing: Irish women's writing and traditions, NYU Press, 2002, ISBN 081479906X p.536

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed (1913). Catholic Encyclopedia. Robert Appleton Company.