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Marie Belloc Lowndes

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Marie Adelaide Belloc was the daughter of Louis Marie Belloc (1830-1872) and Elizabeth Rayner Parkes (1829-1925), born in George Street, Marylebone, London. Marie's mother, better known as 'Bessie', founded the Woman's Suffrage Committee in England in 1866 with her best friend Barbara Bodichon. 'Bessie' Parkes was the granddaughter of Elizabeth Ryland (c.1769-1824) and Joseph Priestley, Jr. (1768-1833). Those maternal grandparents were respectively the children of Samuel Ryland (1745-1817), industrialist of Birmingham, England, and Joseph Priestley (1733-1804), the Unitarian minister who discovered oxygen. 'Bessie' soon left her friend Barbara Bodichon to continue 'the cause' so she could marry in 1867 to a French barrister named Louis Belloc, move with his to France and converted to Catholicism. After having her two children, her husband died in August of 1872 from sunstroke she returned to England and lost all interest in feminist issues. However, Marie almost certainly got her writing skills from 'Bessie' who for eight years had edited the magazine "The Englishwoman's Review" considered a much needed voice for women seeking advancement in society during that time. Marie's brother, Joseph Hilaire Pierre René Belloc (1870–1953), although considered an influential writer in his own right was a Member of Parliament and possibly the most outspoken opponent to giving women not only the vote but also any higher education. Marie married Frederick Sawnay Archibald Lowndes (1868-1940) in Kensington, London, England in 1896 and began writing royal biographies and historical novels such as a piece called "H.R.H. The Prince of Wales: an account of his career" (1898). Together they had three children - Edmund Harold Lowndes (1899-1918), Elizabeth Susan Angela Mary Lowndes (1900-1991), Susan Antonia Dorothea Priestley Lowndes (1907-1993). Her work in her day was considered feminist, journalistic and sensational, and as was usually in the early 20th