Susanna Roope Dockery

Susanna Roope Dockery (1856-1927) was an English watercolour painter who lived both in England and in the city of Porto in Portugal. She mainly painted scenes of rural life in Portugal.

Background

Susanna Roope Dockery was born in Porto, the daughter of Cabel Roope, whose family came from

While marriage between the English families of Porto was common, Roope chose to marry Alfred Victor Dockery, the United States Consul in Porto between 1873 and 1876. He was transferred to Leeds, England, where the couple lived after their marriage in 1878. They had three children. Dockery, who was born in 1851 in North Carolina, came from a prominent family of politicians and plantation owners. He owed his diplomatic career after the American Civil War to the family's support of the Republican Party, the party of Abraham Lincoln, but when the Democrats took over the presidency in 1885 he was forced to return to the USA. He took his family with him, but they returned after six years.^[1][4]

Apparently lacking financial support from her husband, Susanna Roope Dockery became for a time dependent on her extended family and friends. She took up watercolour painting as a profession. Her paintings were of the Porto area and she also took a small cottage at

Although it is not known for certain, the development of Dockery's painting skills may have been as the result of her visits to her mother's house in

From 1911, Roope Dockery experienced a series of tragedies. In that year both her brothers died and in the following year her elder son succumbed to tuberculosis. Her younger son, who had emigrated to Africa to be a farmer, died in mysterious circumstances a decade later. She received emotional support from friends and from her daughter's family. She died in September 1927 in Porto and is buried in the churchyard of St James' Church, Porto. Together with her sisters, Ellen and Mary, she is commemorated in a stained glass window in the church.^[1]

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