Donoghue had moved to 101 Maitland Street with her son, Henry, around February 1931; he moved out when he married in 1937, after which she moved to 156 Jamieson Street. She continued to work as a shop assistant. In February 1945, Donoghue divorced her husband, from whom she had separated in 1928 and who now had two sons by another woman, and reverted to using her maiden name. She died of a heart attack on 19 March 1958, at the age of 59, in Gartloch Mental Hospital, where she had probably been staying for a short period of time as a result of mental illness. Although she is listed on her death certificate as May McAllister, she was by then commonly known as Mabel Hannah, having adopted her mother's maiden name and the first name of her daughter, who had died when she was eleven days old.