Mary Weeks Clark (née Parker) was born in Tarboro, Edgecombe County on March 17, 1822. She was the grandchild of an early settler of Tarboro, therefore coming from a family of wealthy plantation owners. She married her first cousin Henry Toole Clarke in 1850, and the couple had six known children. Clark is mentioned in her niece Margaret Eliza Cotten's journal, as being a correspondent of Cotten's mother, Laura Placidia Cotten. She died in Tarboro on May 3, 1896.