(27 Sept. 1867-29 April 1942), author. Born in Cornwall, Ont. Parents: James Bethune and his wife Elizabeth Mary Rattray (form Elizabeth Chesley Rattray also found). Educated in English and French under tutors in Toronto, and at ladies’ schools in Toronto, Berthier-en-Haut, Que., and Brussels, Belgium. She acquired “in early youth a facility in both Canadian languages, English and French.” (Prominent People of the Prov. of Quebec) She was married on 26 Dec. 1888 to A. W. McDougald. (two children) Though he was a Roman Catholic, she remained a Presbyterian. She was a resident with her husband in the United States and Canada including, for some years, GC. During the First World War, while living in Montreal, she was a vigorous worker for the war effort. At this time, and for many years, she was highly active in the work of the Imperial Order of the Daughters of the Empire (IODE). In the early weeks of the war, she addressed a meeting in Cornwall to organize a local chapter of the IODE. (Cornwall Standard 17 Sept. 1914, with long text or report of her speech) Her sister-in-law Mrs John McMartin was also a deeply involved worker for the IODE.
Annie Bethune McDougald wrote articles in newspapers and magazines. Her poems were published in the Canadian Magazine, the Toronto Globe, and the Montreal Star and Montreal Standard, and in the Glengarry-area press, and in two small books, her Songs of Our Maple Saplings (13 pages, 1917) and her Canada’s Coronation Cavalcade (27 pages, 1937). Her poem “Langemark” (signed Annie B. Mc D. Montreal), on the First World War, is in the Cornwall Freeholder 8 July 1915, and her poem “Christmas Day 1941” (signed Annie Bethune McDougald, Westmount, P.Q.), on the Second World War, is in the Glengarry News 26 Dec. 1941. She received the Coronation Medal in 1937. She died at her home in Westmount, Que. The burial was at Mount Royal Cemetery. Prime Minister Mackenzie King sent a message of condolence. She and her husband had a daughter, Mrs Elizabeth Bethune Kiely, who predeceased her parents.
Mrs Annie Bethune McDougald was the sister of the remarkable Mrs Elizabeth Bethune Campbell, who during a long struggle for justice during a dispute over a missing inheritance, argued her own case in person before the Privy Council court. For Mrs Campbell, see the article for their father, James Bethune.
Standard Freeholder 30 April 1942, Glengarry News 15 May 1942 (includes quotation from her verse, text of Prime Minister King’s message) * biog. sketch, with much useful detail, in Prominent People of the Province of Quebec 1923-24 (Montreal 1924?) * her article on William Lyon Mackenzie repr. SFH 1 Nov. 1937 from Montreal Gazette * Watters 124