The Welsh travel writer Margaret Jones poses for a portrait
A photograph of Margaret Jones taken around 1875.

Margaret Jones (March 1842 – October 18, 1902) was a 19th-century Welsh travel writer whose work was published under the pseudonym Y Gymraes o Ganaan.

Biography

Margaret Jones was born in 1842 in Rhosllannerchrugog, Denbighshire, Wales.[1][2]

As a child, she only received three weeks of schooling. She then left for Birmingham, where she worked as a maid for a Jewish family that had been converted to Christianity. It was in this role that she began traveling the world, spending two years in Paris and four in Jerusalem with the family as they performed missionary work in the Jewish communities there.[2][3]

Jones became well known in Wales for writing accounts of her international travels, notably in Palestine and Morocco.[1] Over the course of her travels, she visited five continents: Europe, Asia, Africa, North America, and Oceania.[2] She wrote in Welsh under the pseudonym Y Gymraes o Ganaan, meaning "The Welsh Lady from Canaan."[1][4]

In 1869, she published Llythyrau Cymraes o Wlad Canaan, a collection of letters home from her travels in Palestine. Her subsequent memoir of her travel to Morocco, Morocco a'r hyn a welais yno, was published in 1883.[1]

After further travels in the United States, Jones eventually settled in Australia, where she married a wealthy farmer named James Josey, who had been exiled there from England. She lived there until her death, in Redbank Plains, Queensland, in 1902.[1][2][5][6]

Further reading

  • Jones, Eirian (2012).The Welsh Lady from Canaan. Y Lolfa Cyf. ISBN 978-1-84771-422-0

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Griffiths, Griffith Milwyn. "JONES, MARGARET (' Y Gymraes o Ganaan '; 1842 - 1902) traveler and writer". Dictionary of Welsh Biography. Retrieved 2021-02-24.
  2. 1 2 3 4 "Author's notes: Eirian Jones". WalesOnline. 2012-11-03. Retrieved 2021-02-24.
  3. ↑ Aaron, Jane (2010). Nineteenth-century women's writing in wales : nation, gender and identity. Cardiff: University of Wales Press. ISBN 978-0-7083-2287-1. OCLC 649479450.
  4. ↑ Jones, Eirian (2012). The Welsh lady from Canaan : the adventures of Margaret Jones on five continents. Talybont, Ceredigion: Y Lolfa Cyf. ISBN 978-1-84771-422-0. OCLC 808867219.
  5. ↑ "Author's Australian Adventure". Y Fasnach Lyfrau Ar-lein - Welsh Book Trade Info. 2012-06-15. Retrieved 2021-02-24.
  6. ↑ "Travel tale reaches far". Queensland Times. 2012-06-08. Retrieved 2021-02-24.
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