Mrs. Jones Makes Her Mark [Sharon Hollingsworth]

Was Mrs. Ann Jones of the Glenrowan Inn illiterate? That is something I had not thought about previously until reading an article in Meanjin magazine last year called "Ned's Women A Fractured Love Story" which was written by Clare Wright & Alex McDermott. The article, which contrasts and compares the lives of Ann Jones and Ellen Kelly, had the following statement:

"Their origins may have been practically identical—illiterate, poor Irish Catholic girls—but their paths diverged radically."

I had read in Ian Jones's "A Short Life" where Ellen Kelly could read but could not write (but, as an update, later I saw in her prison record where it said she could neither or write). But concerning Ann Jones I started to wonder how that could be that she was illiterate since there were all those letters she wrote to officials and the newspaper regarding her compensation case. It was not until the past few weeks when I started to do some very  in depth research into Mrs. Jones's life for some upcoming blog posts that I harkened back to that statement about her being illiterate. What I found confused me.
I saw a handful of letters Ann wrote and I immediately noticed that they were all not in the same handwriting (also saw where she allegedly signed something else..more about that later). To my untrained eye a couple of the signatures looked closely alike but a couple of them were nothing like the others. One of the letters had handwriting that was quite elegant and professional looking, another not as elegant but legible and one of them had a very childlike chicken scratch scrawl. Perhaps she dictated the letters to someone? Maybe to a clerk at her lawyer's firm? Maybe a family member? Or did she write one of them and some done by others?

What makes me really confused was looking at the probates and wills for Ann and her second husband. In the probate affidavit for her second husband (wherein her name is given as Ann Smith) in 1901 there is this bit:

"...I certify that previously to the said Ann Smith swearing the affidavit before us we as foresaid the same was read over and explained to her in my presence and she seemed perfectly to understand the same and made her mark thereto in my presence she being illiterate and unable to write."

Then at the bottom of her will and testament there is this:

"Signed and acknowledged by the said Ann Smith the Testratrix by her making her mark hereto she being unable to write..the same having been previously read over and explained to her and by her declared to be her last Will and Testament in the presence of us both present at the same time who in her presence at her request and in the presence of each other have hereunto subscribed our names as witnesses."

In both of those there is a large X and they have her name and say it is her mark.

Then in another section I read where one of the undersigned witnesses said:

"...said will was then read over and explained to her in our presence both present and at the same time and she said "that is right" and she then signed the same making her mark thereto unassisted by any person where it now appears she being illiterate and unable to write..."

So was she illiterate? From these legal forms it would seem so, but there is a fly in the ointment. Back during the compensation inquiry there is something that is signed with her name and it then said under it  "witness to the signature W.S. Montfort." This signature was one that was somewhat like another I saw in the letters. Unless she had made an X that was incorporated into her name later by a clerk I am more confused than ever!