Mary Grealey (1867)
Mary Grealey was born in Liverpool in 1844. She started her criminal life in her teens and spent five months in Glasgow prison when she was about seventeen years old. She received the sentence for theft and was sent to prison again twice for the same offence in the following years of her life.
Mary had a number of aliases and in 1867 was sentenced to seven years’ penal servitude for larceny as Jane Clark. She would commit many more offences and was convicted under different names in towns and cities across Britain. It appears from newspaper reports that Mary may have also committed offences in Ireland.
In 1883 at Liverpool Sessions, Mary received another seven years’ sentence for stealing a purse containing 15 shillings and sixpence. She was sent to Millbank Prison. Later that year, Mary was received at Fulham Prison and worked in the laundry. During her time in prison she wrote to friends and family, including her children (Mary may have had two of three children).
Mary was sent to the Russell House Refuge in January 1887 on a conditional licence to serve the last three years of her sentence. She actually left the refuge on 1 October 1887, receiving permission to do so from the directors of the Convict Prison. On leaving the refuge, Mary headed back to the place of her birth, Liverpool.
Source: Victorian Convicts: 100 Criminal Lives, eds. Helen Johnston, Barry Godfrey & David J. Cox (Barnsley: Pen and Sword, 2016) pp.92-93.