This biography is republished from The Dictionary of Irish Biography and was written by Linde Lunney and Pauric J. Dempsey. Shared by permission in line with Creative Commons ‘Attribution’ (CC BY) licencing.
Born: 3 May 1868, Ireland
Died: 16 February 1949
Country most active: United Kingdom
Also known as: Hester Travers-Smith
Hester Meredith Dowden (1868–1949), was born 3 May 1868, the same birthday as her father. She detested and resented her stepmother, and in order to escape married (4 February 1896) Richard Travers-Smith (d. 1945), a fashionable Dublin doctor. After he admitted an adulterous affair with a patient in 1915, his wife moved to London and was granted a divorce in November 1922. She reverted to her maiden name by deed poll, and, as Hester Dowden, became one of the most famous spiritualist mediums of the twentieth century. She claimed she had given over 40,000 sittings to clients, including the former Queen Victoria Eugenia of Spain, and she collaborated with Sir William Fletcher Barrett and Geraldine Cummins on psychical research. Hester Dowden published transcriptions of material produced during séances, which she claimed had been dictated by spirit guides. She believed that these guides included an ancient Greek philosopher called Johannes, another Greek called Philip who had known Jesus Christ, St Francis of Assisi, Ellen Terry, and Oscar Wilde. A three-act play, said to be Wilde’s posthumous work, was transcribed by Dowden, who quoted the spirit of Wilde as remarking that being dead was as boring as being married or having dinner with a schoolmaster. Hugh Lane allegedly contacted her just after his death in 1915 to make clear his plans for the controversial Lane bequest of paintings to Dublin; and interestingly, given her father’s lifelong interest in Shakespeare, Hester Dowden received spirit communications which purported to settle the question of the authorship of Shakespearean plays and provided hitherto unknown details of Shakespeare’s life; she published ‘Shakespearian’ sonnets and parts of plays.
She and Travers-Smith had one son and a daughter, Dorothy (‘Dolly’) Travers-Smith, who painted scenery for productions at the Abbey Theatre, and who married Lennox Robinson. Hester Dowden died after suffering a stroke and falling into an electric fire at her home in London on 16 February 1949. She was cremated and buried at Golders Green.