Occupation writer Subject Roman Catholic saints | Nationality British Parents Thomas William Allies | |
Died 27 January 1927, St John's Wood, London, United Kingdom Books The Life of Pope Pius the Seve, History of the Church in Englan, Three Catholic Reformer, The Life of Pope Pius the Seve, Pius the Seventh - 1800‑1823 | ||
Mary Helen Agnes Allies (2 February 1852 – 27 January 1927) was a Catholic historian, writer and translator.
Life
Allies was born on 2 February 1852. She was the eldest daughter of Thomas William and Eliza (born Hall) Allies. Her father had been a fellow at Oxford and he had risen to be the chaplain to the Bishop of London. He had however made a life-changing move to Roman Catholicism in 1850.
Her father was secretary of the Catholic Poor School Committee. She had five siblings and they lived in St John's Wood in London where it is presumed she was born. The family moved to Portman Square and Mary went to Catholic schools in St Leonards and Paris. Allies gave a lot of respect to her father and in time she would write his biography. She said that she fed "on the marrow of his mind" when she was the only child living at home. Her first work, The Life of Pius VII, was published in 1875. It was well researched, but strongly pro-Catholic. The book looked at a supreme pope in conflict with the Napoleonic French state. Pius VII's conflict included him being arrested. Allies' biography was based on sources in four languages. This, and the shorter version published in 1897, is still (2004) the only available biography of Pius VII in English and is therefore a standard work.
Her next work was considered too pious and uncritical of her subjects. She wrote about the Dominican friar Saint Vincent Ferrier, Saint Bernardino of Siena and the "Soldier Saint" John of Capistrano. Her next work was taken from the works Saint Augustine which was published in 1886 and this was followed up by his letters. In the interim she published a book about another Catholic saint, John Chrysostom, in 1889. A different title was The History of the Church of England which she published between 1892 and 1897. This was a partisan view of the Anglican church before 1603.
She translated an extract of John of Damascus's De fide Orthoxa in 1898. When her mother died in 1902 and her father the following year she occupied herself writing a biography of her father, writing journal articles and caring for her brother's children. She died at her home in St John's Wood in 1927.