Lesley Roscoe Nield (later Bowles) graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor of Arts in 1938. After undertaking articles with H. (Halse) Millett and R. C. (Robert Campbell) Cathels of Sydney, she was admitted as a solicitor on 21 November 1941. On 12 February 1954, the now Lesley Roscoe Bowles was admitted to the New South Wales Bar. She did not, however, practise as a barrister. For a number of years until his retirement in 1962, Bowles was clerk to her father, Mr Justice John Roscoe Nield of the Supreme Court of New South Wales. In 1969, Bowles graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor of Laws. She practised with the firms Greenwell & York and Hickson, Lakeman & Holcombe.

Sources used to compile this entry: O'Brien, Joan M., 'A History of Women in the Legal Profession in New South Wales', MA thesis, Department of History, University of Sydney, 1986. Also available at https://womenlawyersnsw.org.au/wp-content/uploads/History-of-Women-in-Legal-Profession.pdf; Women Lawyers Association of New South Wales, https://womenlawyersnsw.org.au/wp-content/uploads/History-of-Women-in-Legal-Profession.pdf, accessed online 6 March 2016; New South Wales Law Almanac for 1955, A. H. Pettifer, Government Printer, Sydney, 1955, pp. 50, 84; New South Wales Law Almanac for 1962, V. C. N. Blight, Government Printer, Sydney, 1962, pp. 55, 96; 1963, p. 94; 1967, p. 115; 1971, p. 120; New South Wales Law Almanac for 1981, D. West, Government Printer, New South Wales, 1981, p. 122; 1982, pp. 128, 195; Calendar for the University of Sydney for the Year 1938, Sydney: David Harold Paisley, Government Printer, Publisher to the University, 1938, pp. 569, 709 (page number reads incorrectly as 703); The University of Sydney Calendar Supplement 1970, V. C. N. Blight, Government Printer, New South Wales, 1970, p. 138; 'Advertising', The Sydney Morning Herald, 18 November 1941, p. 2, http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/17774266, accessed online 1 March 2016; 'Daughter Of Judge A Barrister', The Sydney Morning Herald, Saturday 13 February 1954, p. 9, http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/18409599, accessed online 1 March 2016; The Ryerson Index (See: 'Bowles, Lesley Roscoe', The Sydney Morning Herald, Saturday 18 September 1993, p. 90).