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A Second Moses in Bonnet and Shawl:1 Caroline Chisholm, 1808–1877

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 September 2015

Carole Walker  and
Jane L. Littlewood
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Extract

Caroline Chisholm was a Victorian philanthropist designated by the Australian Encyclopaedia as ‘the greatest of women pioneers in the history of Australia’. She was born in Northampton in 1808, the daughter of William Jones, hog-jobber of some substance. She married Archibald Chisholm in 1830, a lieutenant in the East India Company Army, ten years her senior, on the understanding that she be allowed to undertake philanthropic works. It is assumed she converted to her husband's Roman Catholic faith either just before or after the marriage. It was in Madras, where her husband was based, that her philanthropic endeavours began and she founded a ‘school of industry for the daughters of European soldiers’. The school educated the sadly-neglected girls in general education and domestic duties.

Type
Research Article
Information
British Catholic History , Volume 22 , Issue 3 , May 1995 , pp. 409 - 423
Copyright
Copyright © Catholic Record Society 1995

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Footnotes

1

‘A Carol on Caroline Chisholm’, Punch, August 1853. Authorship unknown.

References

Notes

2 Kiddle, Margaret, Caroline Chisholm, (Melbourne, 1950), pp. 51–53.Google Scholar

3 Sydney Morning Herald, 18th October 1860

4 Harris, R., What has Mrs. Chisholm Done for N.S.W.?, (Sydney, 1862), p. 14.Google Scholar

5 Kiddle, op. cit., 1990 ed., p. 184. First published 1950. Also quoted in R. Harris, What has Mrs. Chisholm Done for N.S.W.?, (1862) and by Elliot Anstruther, G., Caroline Chisholm the Emigrants’ Friend, (C.T.S., 1916).Google Scholar

6 Mackenzie, Eneas, The Emigrant's Guide to Australia with a Memoir of Mrs. Chisholm, (Webb, Millington Co., 1852) p. 4.Google Scholar

7 Rev. James G. Murtagh, Caroline Chisholm—Who Was She—Was She a Saint?, a pamphlet based on five radio talks later serialised in The Advocate, September 22-October 20 1966, p. 9.

8 Ibidem, p. 9.

9 Hoban, Mary, Caroline Chisholm—A Biography—Fifty-one Pieces of Wedding Cake, (Melbourne, 1984).Google Scholar

10 Female Immigration considered, in a brief account of the Sydney Immigrants Home by the Secretary Mrs. Chisholm, , (Sydney, 1842) p. 2.Google Scholar

11 Female Emigration, p. 3.

12 Female Immigration, pp. 3, 4.

13 Murtagh, op. cit. p. 10.

14 Arnstein, Walter L., Protestant versus Catholic in Mid-Victorian England, Mr. Newdegate and the Nuns, (Columbia & London, 1982) p. 5.Google Scholar

15 Ibidem p. 5. Morley, John, Life of Gladstone, (London, 1903) 1: pp. 53–54, 72.Google Scholar

16 Fifty-one pieces of Wedding Cake, op. cit. p. 3.

17 Female Immigration, op. cit. p. 6.

18 Fifty-one Pieces of Wedding Cake, op. cit. p. 52.

19 Sydney Morning Herald, 14th March 1846.

20 Kiddle, op. cit., 1990 ed., p. 93.

21 Ibidem p. 93.

22 Madgwick, R. B., Immigration into Eastern Australia 1788–1851. (Sydney, 1969) First published 1937. p. 234.Google Scholar

23 For a detailed account of the accusations, see Fifty-One Pieces of Wedding Cake, op. cit. pp. 177–81.

24 Letter of Chisholm, Caroline ‘To the Colonists of N.S. Wales’ Sydney Morning etterald, 20th March 1846.Google Scholar

25 Rev. Mackenzie, D., The Emigrants’ Guide—on Ten Years Practical Experience in Australia, (W. S. Orr & Co., 1845). pp. 44 Google Scholar et seq. See Prochaska, F. K., Women and Philanthropy in Nineteenth Century England, (O.U.P., 1980).Google Scholar

27 Memoirs of Mrs. Caroline Chisholm with an account of her Philanthropic Labours, in India, Australia &England, to which is added A History of the Family Colonization Loan Society with its Rules, Regulations,and Pledges, (Webb, Millington & Co. 1852) p. 144.

28 Emigrant's Guide to Australia, published in London, 1853.

29 Johnson, Edgar, The Heart of Charles Dickens, (London 1952).Google Scholar Charles Dickens to Miss Coutts, 4th March 1850.

30 Kiddle, op. cit. (1990 ed.) pp. 131–4. For fuller debate of the subject, see Kiddle, ‘Caroline Chisholm and Charles Dickens’ in Australian and New Zealand Historical Studies, 3, 1945–49, 10, pp. 77–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

31 Healey, Edna, Coutts & Co., 1692–1992—The Portrait of a Private Bank, (London, 1992), p. 311.Google Scholar

32 ‘A Bundle of Emigrants’ Letters’, Household Words, 1, 30 Mar. 1850, p. 19.

33 See also Household Words: ‘Pictures of Life in Australia’, 1, 22 June 1850, p. 307; ‘Chips—Family Colonisation Loan Society’, 1, 24 Aug 1850, p. 514; ‘Chips—Safety for Female Emigrants’, 3, 31 May 1851, p. 228; ‘A Rainy Day on “The Euphrates”’, 4, 24 Jan 1852, p. 96; ‘Better Ties Than Red Tape Ties’, 4, 28 Feb 1852, p. 101; ‘The Iron Seamstress’, 8, 11 Feb 1854, p. 575.

34 Dark, Eleanor ‘Caroline Chisholm and Her Times’ in The Peaceful Army: a Memorial to the Pioneer Women of Australia 1788–1938, ed. Flora Eldershaw, (Sydney, 1938), p. 62.Google Scholar

35 Female Immigration, op. cit. Preface, p. 7.

36 Emigration and Transportation Relatively Considered. In a Letter, dedicated, by Permission, to Earl Grey. By Mrs. Chisholm, (John Ollivier, 1847), p. 3.Google Scholar

37 Family Colonisation Loan Society, by the Grant of Loans for Two Years without Interest; or: A System of Emigration to the Colonies of N.S. W., Port Phillip, and South Australia; in a Letter Dedicated by Permissionto Lord Ashley, M.P. by Mrs. Chisholm, (August 1849).

38 The A.B.C. of Colonisation in a Series of Letters by Mrs. Chisholm, (John Ollivier, 1850) pp. 9, 27.Google Scholar

39 Mackenzie, op. cit.. Emigrants’ Guide to Australia, pp. 4/5.

40 Chisholm, Caroline, Prospectus of a Work to be Entitled ‘Voluntary Information from the People of New South Wales’, respecting the Social Conditions of the Middle and Working Classes in that Colony, (Sydney, 1845)Google Scholar

41 Report, Distressed Labourers, Votes and Proceedings, Legislative Council, N.S.W. (1843), p. 729.Google Scholar See Kiddle, op. cit. (1950) p. 49.

42 Captain Robert Towns was a wealthy landowner interested in immigration. He was later a pioneer in the South Sea trade, and the first to introduce cotton growing in Queensland; Townsville is named after him. Kiddle (1950), op. cit., p. 49.

43 Report, Distressed Labourers, V&P. Leg. Council, NSW, 1844, 2, pp. 601–604. Kiddle, (1950), op. cit., p. 52.

44 Eleanor Dark, op. cit., p. 75.

45 Chisholm, Caroline, Female Immigration, op. cit. p. 39.Google Scholar

46 Ibidem, p. 103.

47 Ibidem, p. 106.

48 Ibidem, p. 107.

49 Murtach, op. cit., p. 15.

50 Connole, Patrick, ‘Caroline Chisholm: The Irish Chapter’ in Kiernan, Colm, ed. Australia and Ireland 1788–1988—Bicentenary Essays, (1986), pp. 241–251.Google Scholar

51 ‘Caroline Chisholm and Jewish Immigration’, Australian Jewish Historical Society, 2., 1944, pp. 67–77.Google Scholar

52 Ibidem, p. 73.