1. Mary Reibey nee Haydock was an English-born merchant, shipowner and trader who was transported to Australia as a convict.
17 Facts About Mary Reibey
1. 2.
Thomas Reibey was granted land on the Hawkesbury River, where he and Mary lived and farmed following their marriage.
3.
Thomas Mary Reibey commenced a cargo business along the Hawkesbury River to Sydney and later moved to Sydney.
4.
Mary Reibey acquired several farms on the Hawkesbury River and traded in coal, cedar, furs and skins.
5.
Mary Reibey entered into a partnership with Edward Wills, and trading activities were extended to the Bass Strait, the Pacific Islands and, from 1809 to China and India.
6.
When Thomas Reibey died on 5 April 1811, Mary assumed sole responsibility for the care of seven children and the control of numerous business enterprises.
7.
Mary Reibey was no stranger to this task, having managed her husband's affairs during his frequent absences from Sydney.
8.
Now a woman of considerable wealth by her husband's businesses, Mary Reibey continued to expand her business interests.
9.
Mary Reibey was one of the founding Governors of the Free Grammar School in 1825.
10.
Mary Reibey built a cottage in the suburb of Hunters Hill, New South Wales, circa 1836, where she lived for some time.
11.
Mary Reibey was buried at the Sandhills Cemetery, and, when that was resumed, moved to the cemetery at La Perouse.
12.
An enterprising and determined person of strong personality, during her lifetime Mary Reibey earned a reputation as an astute and successful business woman in the colony of New South Wales.
13.
Mary Reibey is featured on the obverse of Australian twenty-dollar notes printed since 1994 and on its replacement design since 2019.
14.
Mary Reibey was posthumously inducted onto the Victorian Honour Roll of Women in 2001.
15.
Donkin wrote An Emancipist, illustrated by Jane Robinson, a biography of Mary Reibey, written for children.
16.
Grantlee Kieza's biography, The Remarkable Mrs Mary Reibey was published in 2023.
17.
Mary Reibey inspired the TV musical Pardon Miss Westcott and her life was dramatised in the radio plays Fulfilment by Rex Rienits and Mary Reibey by Dymphna Cusack.