Susan Bowen, nee Mellett (1870 – 1962)
Susan Mellett was born in Dublin, Ireland.1) She taught in the “Ragged Schools” on the streets during a time of political unrest. A prolonged period of unrest started in 1879 when Irish tenant farmers protested the practices of their British landlords.2)
Mellett was the first single woman hired by the Church Missionary Society to go and teach in the northern Canadian mission.3) She was twenty-two in 1893 when Bishop Bompas met her at St. Michael and escorted her up the Yukon River to Forty Mile. Mellett taught the children at the mission school and helped Mrs. Bompas with the household work.4) One time, when Mrs. Bompas was away, she nursed the bishop through a severe bout of scurvy.5) Bishop Bompas spent many hours teaching Mellett Tukudh, Archdeacon McDonald’s translation of the Gwichin language.6)
In 1894, Susan Mellett accompanied the Canhams, a missionary couple, to Rampart House as Mrs. Canham was in poor health. Mellett remembered an active school when the Gwichin were in town, but they were often away hunting and fishing. The winter of 1895/96 was harsh, and she reported near famine conditions. She also went eighteen months without mail as the trading post was closed and there was no regular traffic. In June 1896 the Canhams left on furlough and Mellett returned to Forty Mile.7)
Susan met Richard Bowen who had arrived at Forty Mile from England in 1895, and they were married in 1896 by Bishop Bompas.8) They travelled to Dawson in 1898 and taught and preached for the first few months in a tent. Rev. Bowen built a log cabin that had triple duty as a church, day school and rectory. There was a partition between the church and the rectory where they lived. The living room, kitchen and vestry were on the main floor, and they slept in a loft reached by a ladder. Their home was open to many lonely and tired parishioners.9)
Reverend Bowen contracted typhoid in May 1898, and they returned to England for his convalescence. Bishop Bompas promised not to call them unless he was desperate, and the call came within the year to build a church at Whitehorse. The Bowens came in on the second passenger train after the railroad was finished. The first Anglican church in Whitehorse was finished in the autumn of 1900 and was used for the next sixty years.10)
The first school in Whitehorse was started in 1901 in the Presbyterian Church. There were forty-one students of school age in town. The interim school ran for a year with increasing enrollment. Patrick Campbell was the first teacher. A junior division was created in January 1902 and Susan Bowen stepped in to teach the primary pupils. After the new two-room school was built on Lambert Street, two teachers were brought in to take over the classes.11)
In the spring of 1903, Reverend Bowen became seriously ill again, and the Bowens left the Yukon for good. They worked in Nanaimo and Ladysmith in British Columbia, and then moved to London, Ontario.12) Susan Bowen kept her interest in the Yukon, and the Christ Church Branch of the Women’s Auxiliary made her a Diocesan Life Member of the organization for her lifetime of work helping others.13)