Timeline

October 14, 1888
Kathleen Mansfield Beauchamp is born to Annie Dyer and Harold Beauchamp, residing at 11 Tinakori Rd, Wellington, New Zealand, “a little land with no history.” She will be one of six children.

1895
Begins school at Karori village school.

1898
Attends Wellington Girls’ High School.
Publishes first work in High School Reporter.

1899
Transfers to Miss Swainson’s school where she meets Maori princess Maata Mahupuku, later remembered in novel fragment, “Maata.”
KM described by teacher as “surly” and “imaginative to the point of untruth.”

1902
Frequents the musical Trowell family. Falls in love with Tom (Arnold) Trowell, cellist, whom she calls “Caesar.”
Dreams of pursuing a musical career.

January 29, 1903
The Beauchamps sail to England on the S.S Niwaru. The trip lasts forty-two days.

1903 – June 1906
Enrolls with sisters Vera and Chaddie at Queen’s College, Harley Street to be “finished.”
Develops friendship with Ida Constance Baker.
Adopts the name “Katherine Mansfield,” while Ida becomes “Lesley Moore”.
Meets first literary mentor, Walter Rippmann, German teacher.
Discovers the work of Oscar Wilde.
Publishes five stories in school magazine and becomes its editor.
Completes studies at Queen’s College in June.
Works on novel fragment “Juliet”.
KM’s period at Queen’s College is recorded in Ida Baker’s memoirs, The Memories of LM.

December 1906 – June 1908
Returns with sisters to New Zealand but cannot adjust.
Friendship with Edie Bendall recorded in diary.
Publishes three stories “Vignettes,” “Silhouettes,” and ” In a Café” in Australian newspaper, Native Companion.
Takes a camping trip to visit the hinterland of New Zealand at the insistence of her father.
Writes “The Education of Audrey,” heavily influenced by Oscar Wilde.

July 6, 1908
Leaves New Zealand for England aboard the Papanui never to return.

Summer 1908
Resides at student hostel, Beauchamp Lodge, near the canal at Paddington.
Receives from family a weekly allowance of forty shillings: thirty for the rent and ten for the rest.

Autumn – Winter 1908
Reconnects with the Trowell family now in London.
Transfers her feelings to Tom’s twin brother, Garnet, a violinist.
Becomes pregnant by Garnet.

January 1909
Publishes “The Education of Audrey” in the Evening Post.
Begins to find a mature voice with her story “The Tiredness of Rosabel”.

March 2, 1909
Marries George Bowden, singing and elocution teacher, ten years her senior, at the Paddington Registry Office.
Wears black to her wedding with Ida as only witness.
Leaves Bowden immediately afterwards.
Bowden later caricatured in “Mr. Reginald Peacock’s Day”, Nine years pass before their divorce.

May 1909
Disapproving of KM’s attachment to Ida, Annie Beauchamp takes her daughter to Bad Worishofen, Bavaria and leaves her there, probably unaware that she is pregnant.
Experiences here provide material for her first collection In a German Pension.

Late June 1909(?)
Has a miscarriage

Summer 1909
Romantic involvement with Floryan Sobieniowski, Polish critic and translator through whom she discovers Chekhov and new Russian literature.
Writes “The Child Who Was Tired” borrowing a plot from Chekhov.
May have contracted gonorrhea from Floryan with whom she plans to run away to Paris.

January 1910
Returns to London, residing at the Strand Palace Hotel.
Floryan eagerly awaits her in Paris, but she ends their affair.

Late Winter 1910
Lives briefly with George Bowden.
Meets Alfred Richard Orage, editor of The New Age, future pupil of G.I. Gurdjieff .
Publishes “The Child Who Was Tired” in The New Age.
Will later credit Orage as being the person who “taught her how to write.”

March 1910
After an attack of peritonitis, undergoes operation to remove infected Fallopian tube. Ida nurses her back to health at Rottingdean.

Summer 1910
Befriended by Orage and his mistress, South African writer, Beatrice Hastings, caustic critic for the New Age, future lover and model of Amedeo Modigliani.
House-sits a flat in Cheyne Walk.
Becomes friends with William Orton with whom she keeps a journal.
Orton will depict her in his autobiographical novel, The Last Romantic, which includes passages apparently written by KM.

November 1910
Post-Impressionist Exhibition opens in London, with works by Van Gogh, Gauguin, Picasso, Matisse. KM will be among the many visitors.

January 1911
Moves to 69 Clovelly Mansions in Gray’s Inn Road.

Spring 1911
May have been pregnant again.
Ida Baker recounts the episode in The Memories of LM

June 22, 1911
Coronation of George V attended by the Beauchamp family with whom she is reunited.
Re-establishes ties with younger brother Leslie, “Chummie”.

December 1911
Publication of In a German Pension.
Submits “The Woman at the Store,” New Zealand murder story to Rhythm, avant-garde magazine edited by John Middleton Murry.
Meets Murry at dinner party organized by W.L. George.

April 1912
Murry moves in as KM’s lodger at 69 Clovelly Mansions, occupying “the Buddha room” at 7s.6d a month.
This period is vividly described in Murry’s autobiography, Between Two Worlds.

Spring 1912
Becomes assistant editor of Rhythm.
Attacked by Hastings and Orage in The New Age.

August 1912
Forced with Murry to leave Clovelly Mansions because they are not married

September 1912
Moves with Murry to Runcton Cottage near Chichester.
Quarrel with Henri Gaudier and Sophie Brzeska.
Receives uninvited guest, Floryan Sobieniowski.

October 1912
The publisher of Rhythm goes bankrupt.
KM pledges annual income from her father to pay back a printer’s debt for four years.

Moves with Murry back to London to dreary digs in Chancery Lane, furnished with a camp bed, two chairs, and a packing case.
They struggle to keep the magazine afloat.
Contributors include Hugh Walpole and DH Lawrence.

Christmas 1912
Spends Christmas in Paris with Murry.

March 1913
In need of fresh air, KM rents a house in the country in Buckinghamshire where Murry is to join her on weekends.
They find the separation stressful

May 1913
Rhythm becomes the short-lived Blue Review and publishes a story by DH Lawrence, “The Soiled Rose”.

June 1913
Friendship develops with DH Lawrence and Frieda.
Murry later describes the foursome swimming naked in a lake and feasting on steak and tomatoes.
This relationship will partly provide inspiration for Lawrence’s novel, Women in Love, with KM serving as a model for Gudrun and Murry for Gerald.

July 1913
Moves with Murry to Baron’s Court, described by Ida as “a suburban flatlet with communal gardens at the back.” Murry occupies the study while KM
works on the dining table.

November 1913
Completes opening chapters of “Maata”.

December 1913
Moves with Murry to 31 Rue de Tournon, Paris.
Is attracted to bohemian writer Francis Carco.
Writes “Something Childish but Very Natural”.

February 1914
Leaves Paris with Murry after he is declared bankrupt and returns to London.
Carco helps them dispose of their furniture by selling it to brothels.
Ida sends money by post, tearing a five-pound note in half and enclosing it in two separate envelopes to make sure it would not be stolen by postal workers.

April 1914
Moves with Murry to Fulham (102 Edith Grove).

July 1914
Moves with Murry to Chelsea (111 Arthur Street)

July 13, 1914
KM and Murry are witnesses at the wedding of DH Lawrence and Frieda.

August 4, 1914
War is declared.

October 1914 – Feb 1915
Moves with Murry to Rose Tree Cottage in Buckinghamshire, close to the Lawrences, whose frequent quarrels create a a strained atmosphere.
First meeting with Kotelianski.
In Between Two Worlds Murry, describes his endless philosophical discussions with Lawrence and Gordon Campbell which make KM feel isolated and estranged.

February 3, 1915
Leslie arrives in England for military training.

February 15, 1915
Brief trip to France to join Carco. The episode provides inspiration for “An Indiscreet Journey”.

Feb 25, 1915
Returns to Murry at Rose Tree Cottage.

March –May 1915
Divides her time between Murry’s flat in London and Carco’s flat in Paris, near the Quai des Fleurs, while Carco is at the front.
Begins writing “The Aloe,” reevoking her New Zealand childhood.

June 1915
Moves with Murry to 5 Acacia Road in St John’s Wood.
Receives frequent visits from Leslie while he is stationed in England.
In the garden of this house grows KM’s pear tree.

October 7, 1915
Leslie Beauchamp is killed in France while demonstrating how to use a hand grenade.
KM plunges into depression.

November 1915
Moves with Murry to Bandol in the south of France.

December 7, 1915
Murry returns to London.

December 1915
Receives a moving letter of sympathy from Lawrence consoling her for Leslie’s death.

December 31, 1915 – February 1916
Murry joins KM in Bandol at the Villa Pauline.
KM rewrites “The Aloe.”

April 1916
Returns to England with Murry and moves to Higher Tregerthen in Cornwall to be near the Lawrences, but finds their company overwhelming.

June 1916
Moves with Murry to Mylor in the south Cornish coast.

September 1916
Murry starts work as a translator in military intelligence.
He and KM take up residence in Bloomsbury at 3 Gower Street.
Painter Dorothy Brett lived on the second floor; Dora Carrington in the attic.

Autumn 1916
Frequents Lady Ottoline Morrell in Garsington
The circle includes: Lytton-Strachey, T.S. Eliot, Bertrand Russell, Aldous Huxley among others.

November 1916
Friendship and correspondence with Bertrand Russell begins.
First meeting with Virginia Woolf.

February 1917
Moves to a studio at 141a Church street in Chelsea, later joined by Ida.
Murry moves to 47 Redcliffe Road.
Friendship develops with Virginia Woolf.

April 1917
Begins writing for the New Age again.
Proposes “Prelude” to the Hogarth Press.

Winter 1917
Discovers spot on right lung.

January – February 1918
Returns alone to Bandol to the Hotel Beau Rivage.
Begins writing “Je Ne Parle Pas Français”.
Ida arrives in Bandol.
Has first lung hemorrhage.

March 1918
Flees to Paris with Ida where they are trapped by the German bombardment

April 11,1918
Returns to London with Ida.

May 3, 1918
KM and Murry are married at the Kensington Registery Office. KM wears Frieda Lawrence’s wedding ring from her first marriage.

May-June 1918
Spends six weeks in Cornwall with Anne Estelle Rice.

August 8, 1918
Annie Beauchamp dies in Wellington.

August 1918
Moves with Murry too 2 Portland Villas, “the elephant” in Hampstead.
Ida comes to live with them as housekeeper.

November 11, 1918
End of World War I

February 1919
Murry becomes editor of The Athenaeum.

April 1919
Begins reviewing for The Athenaeum.
Begins translating Chekhov’s letters with Koteliansky.

September 1919
Travels to San Remo with Murry and Ida.
After Murry’s departure, moves with Ida to the Casetta Deerholm in Ospedaletti.

November 1919
Receives visit from Harold Beauchamp and his cousin Connie.

Mid-December 1919
Murry joins KM in Ospedaletti.

January 1920
Travels with Ida to France and enters a L’Hermitage, a clinic in Menton
Receives insulting letter from DH Lawrence.

February 1920
Goes to live at Villa Flora with Cousin Connie and companion, Jinnie Fullerton.

April, 1920
Returns with Ida to the Elephant in Hampstead.

September 1920
Travels with Ida to France, residing at Villa Isola Bella in Menton.

Autumn 1920
Sobieniowski blackmails KM over youthful love letters.
Assisted by Ida, works intensely on reviews and short stories, including “Miss Brill” and “The Daughters of the Late Colonel,” partially modeled on Ida.
Learns of Murry’s liaison with Elizabeth Bibiesco.

December 2, 1920
Publication of Bliss and Other Stories.

December 1920
Murry joins her for Christmas in Menton.

May 1921-January 1922
Moves to Montreux, Switzerland with Ida.
Moves to Chateau Belle Vue, Sierre where she is joined by Murry.
Moves with Murry to Chalet des Sapins ( Montana-sur-Sierre), near her cousin Elizabeth.
Writes “At the Bay”, “The Garden Party” and “The Doll’s House”.
Obtains the address of Russian doctor Ivan Manoukhin from Koteliansky.
Reads Cosmic Anatomy. Renews correspondence with A.R. Orage, already an enthusiast for Ouspensky and Gurdjieff.

January 30, 1922
Leaves for Paris with Ida

February – May 1922
Decides to try Manoukhin’s X-ray treatment.
Murry joins her in Paris; Ida returns to Switzerland.
Publication of The Garden Party and Other Stories.
Finds treatment debilitating.
Writes “The Fly”.

June, 1922
Returns to Switzerland, near Randogne with Murry.
Moves to Sierre with Ida.

August 1922
Returns to London with Murry and Ida. Stays with Dorothy Brett.
Meets Orage.

September 1922
Attends Ouspensky’s lectures.
Obtains the address of the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man in Fontainebleau from Ouspensky.

October 2, 1922
Travels with Ida to Paris

October 14, 1922
Examined by Dr. James C. Young, pupil of Gurdjieff.

October 16,1922
Enters the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man, not as a pupil but as a guest, or special visitor.
She will be befriended by Olgivanna, future wife of Frank Lloyd Wright, who will later publish a memoir of her friendship with KM in The Bookman, 1931 and by Alexandre de Salzmann and his wife, Jeanne.
Ouspensky recounts a conversation at the institute with KM in In Search of the Miraculous.
Orage will also publish his account of her life there in Talks with Katherine Mansfield at Fontainebleau in The Century, 1924.

January 9,1923
After Murry’s arrival at the institute for a visit, KM climbs a flight of stairs, haemorrhages and dies.