‘Going her Own Road’: The Tortured Path to Economic Independence in Late Colonial New South Wales

Abstract

Feminist historians have long recognised the symbiotic relationship between personal autonomy and a woman's capacity to earn her own living. This paper draws on legal and press documentation to examine how one woman navigated the difficult path of wage-earning during the 1890s. It argues that Catherine Kirchner saw herself as an autonomous economic entity and conducted herself with equal autonomy within her marriage and an extra-marital love affair. The paper concludes that despite the rhetoric of increasing emancipation and opportunity for women in 1890s New South Wales, the path to economic autonomy remained a difficult one to traverse.