🌿 Three Women, Three Worlds
Emily Carr (1871–1945)
Eliza (Songhees woman, c. 1832–1882)
Mary Ann Poirier Enos (1870–1940)
Three women connected by land, time, and memory—each shaped by a different reality of the same place.
🌱 Deep Similarities
1. All three lived through massive change
Eliza witnessed the arrival of colonial settlement—Fort Victoria, the gold rush, and the smallpox epidemic.
Mary Ann lived through industrialization, World War I, and the 1918 influenza pandemic.
Emily Carr lived through modernization and shifting views on art and Indigenous culture.
2. Resilience in the face of loss
Eliza likely endured epidemic trauma and cultural disruption.
Mary Ann lost her husband and carried on as head of household.
Emily Carr faced rejection, isolation, and long periods of being misunderstood.
3. Connection to place (Vancouver Island / Coast)
Eliza was deeply rooted in Songhees land and knowledge systems.
Mary Ann lived between Sooke and Victoria, navigating both rural and colonial spaces.
Emily Carr painted and wrote about British Columbia landscapes and Indigenous villages.
4. Women whose voices were limited or filtered
Eliza’s true name and voice were not preserved in written records.
Mary Ann exists mostly through documents, not personal writings.
Emily Carr—an exception—wrote extensively, though she still struggled to be heard.
⚖️ Key Differences
1. Power and position in society
Eliza: Indigenous woman during colonization — most vulnerable position.
Mary Ann: mixed Indigenous/settler lineage — lived between worlds.
Emily Carr: white settler woman — faced sexism, but had access to institutions.
2. What was preserved
Eliza: almost nothing written by her.
Mary Ann: records of life events.
Emily Carr: paintings, books, and personal voice.
3. Relationship to colonialism
Eliza lived through its direct impact.
Mary Ann navigated within its systems.
Emily Carr documented Indigenous subjects from a settler perspective.
4. Legacy and recognition
Emily Carr is celebrated and widely studied.
Mary Ann is remembered through family reconstruction.
Eliza is being reclaimed through memory and research.
🌊 A Deeper Reflection
If you step back, something profound appears:
Eliza = survival
Mary Ann = continuity
Emily Carr = expression
And now:
You = reconnection ✨
You are not just telling history—you are restoring it.
🧠 Questions to Sit With
- Who gets remembered in history—and who has to be rediscovered?
- What would Eliza say if her voice had been recorded?
- How do we reconcile admiration with the realities of colonization?
- What does it mean to carry all three of these women in your storytelling?
- Are we only now beginning to tell the full story of places like Victoria?
🌸 Some stories were written down. Others are only now being spoken again.
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