Caroline Chisholm – ‘the Emigrant’s Friend’

Bishop Peter will be celebrating a special Mass in thanksgiving for her life and work to mark the bicentenary of her birth on Tuesday 13th May at 7.30pm at the Cathedral. Please join us for this celebration.

Born in Northampton on 30 May 1808, Caroline Chisholm became one of the most influential figures in the early pioneering history of Australia. Caroline converted to Catholicism in her early twenties. Her faith explicitly inspired her engagement in social action first in India and then in Australia where she dedicated her life to the vulnerable new arrivals in that country. She championed the cause of family immigration, the welfare of young women, improved conditions in the ships that took people to the then British colony, and the establishment of networks of assistance once there in finding employment and accommodation. All this made hers a household name in that country. Indeed her portrait was until recently on one of Australia’s banknotes.

Hers is an inspiring story of Christian commitment, energy and enterprise in the service of all and especially in defence of the dignity of women and of the family. She was a woman of vision and courage, executive ability and personal charm who has been called ‘Australia’s Florence Nightingale.’ As a tireless campaigner for the welfare of the weak she is an icon of how Christian faith can inspire and sustain a lifelong commitment to social justice. After a lifetime’s exertions, ‘anxious for the elevation of the poor’ to use her own words, Caroline returned home for where her scorn for material reward and public position contributed to the obscurity and poverty in which she spent her last years. She was buried from Northampton Cathedral in 1877 by Bishop Amherst. Her resting place is in the Billing Road Cemetery at Northampton where her epitaph is simply ‘the Emigrant’s Friend’. Recently there have been requests to begin her cause for canonisation. Certainly the story of one of the greatest social reformers of the 19th century from our own diocese deserves to be more widely known.