From the East – December 2022
Greetings Brethren,
At this year’s Grand Lodge Annual Communication in Atlantic City, NJ, I had the good fortune of meeting and speaking with author, Kathleen Aldworth Foster. She spent a number of years researching the life of Elizabeth St. Leger Aldworth, who she initially thought was an ancestor. Elizabeth Aldworth lived in the 18th Century and was the daughter of Arthur St. Leger, the First Viscount Doneraile of Doneraile, County Cork, Ireland. Arthur St. Leger was a Freemason in Ireland.
Kathleen conducted extensive research on Elizabeth St. Leger Aldworth piecing together whatever historical data she could find. In the end, however, after exhausting all the information she could discover, Kathleen decided to write a historical fiction, which has been defined as “taking the factual record as far as it is known, using that as scaffolding, and then letting imagination build the structure that fills in those things that we can never find out for sure.”
The common belief is that a masonic meeting was taking place at a lodge room at Elizabeth’s family home. Elizabeth had fallen asleep nearby and when awakened, she eavesdropped on the secret meeting. When she was discovered, a discussion ensued as to what was to become of her and apparently death was considered an option. Fortunately, for Elizabeth, a decision was made to make her a Freemason, who would then be bound to keep the secrets of the craft.
According to the author, “Today, there are thousands of active female Freemasons in offshoot organizations around the world. One of them, Le Droit Humain, named its first lodge after her.” The Droit Humain is a “mixed-sex lodge” and has approximately 32,000 members in more than 60 countries around the world. It was cofounded by a Freemason raised at the Grand Lodge of France named Georges Martin. Could the apparent popularity of “mixed-sex” lodges warrant consideration by Grand Lodges in the United States in order to offset declining membership rolls? The apron worn by Elizabeth Aldworth is on display at the Provincial Grand Lodge of Munster in the City of Cork, Ireland.
Source: Aldworth, K. (2018). Doneraile Court: The Story of the Lady Freemason.
Fraternally,
WM John Quintana