Mary Burns

Mary Burns (29 September 1821[1] – 7 January 1863)[2][3][4] was a working-class Irish woman, best known as the lifelong partner of Friedrich Engels.[5][6]

For other people with the same name, see Mary Burns (disambiguation).

Burns lived in Salford, near Manchester, England. She met Engels during his first stay in Manchester, probably early in 1843. It is likely that Burns guided Engels through the region, showing him the worst districts of Salford and Manchester for his research for The Condition of the Working Class in England.[2]

Mary Burns was the daughter of Michael Burns or Byrne, a dyer in a cotton mill, and of Mary Conroy. The family may have lived off Deansgate.[4] She had a younger sister named Lydia (1827–1878), known as “Lizzie", and a niece named Mary Ellen Burns (born 1859), known as "Pumps".

After meeting in the 1840s, Burns and Engels formed a relationship that lasted until Burns' sudden death at the age of 41 on 7 January 1863. Although the custom of the day was marriage, the two politically opposed the bourgeois institution of marriage and never married.[7] After her death Engels lived with her sister Lizzie, whom he married on 11 September 1878, hours before her death.[8]

Not much is written about Mary Burns. The only direct references to Mary Burns that have survived are a letter from Marx to Engels on learning of her death, saying she was "very good natured" and "witty", and a letter from Marx's daughter, Eleanor, saying she was "very pretty, witty and an altogether charming girl, but in later years drank to excess".[9] No images of Burns are known to exist.[10]

References
  1. Roy Whitfield: "Die Wohnorte Friedrich Engels' in Manchester von 1850–1869". In: Nachrichten aus dem Engels-Haus, Heft 3. ceres, Wuppertal 1980, p 80.
  2. Irving, Sarah. (2010-03-15) Frederick Engels and Mary and Lizzy Burns | Manchester's Radical History. Radicalmanchester.wordpress.com. Retrieved on 2014-02-20.
  3. Engels to Marx. 7 January 1863. (Collected Works of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels: Volume 41, p. 441.)
  4. Whitfield, Roy (1988) Friedrich Engels in Manchester, Working Class Movement Library, ISBN 0906932211
  5. Legacies – Work – England – Manchester – Engels in Manchester – Article Page 2. BBC. Retrieved on 2014-02-20.
  6. Certified Copy of an Entry of death (1863-52). See Harald Wessel: Hausbesuch bei Friedrich Engels. Dietz, Berlin 1971, p. 110.
  7. The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State. Marxists.org. Retrieved on 2014-02-20.
  8. Henderson, William Otto (1976). The Life of Friedrich Engels. Psychology Press. p. 567. ISBN 978-0-7146-3040-3.
  9. MARY BURNS SUPERSTAR. Salford Star, issue 6, Winter 2007
  10. Dash, Mike (August 1, 2013). "How Friedrich Engels' Radical Lover Helped Him Father Socialism". Smithsonian.
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