Jane Nassau Senior (1828–1877) was Britain's first female civil servant, and a philanthropist.
She was co-founder of the
Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants
The Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants (MABYS) was a voluntary organisation of middle- and upper-class women, which aimed to support poor young women and girls in London and encourage them to become domestic servants.
Founda ...
(MABYS).
Life
Senior was born Jane Elizabeth Hughes at
Uffington on 10 December 1828, daughter of
John Hughes and the only sister of the author
Thomas Hughes and five other brothers.
Senior did relief work for material aid for the victims of the
Franco-Prussian War of 1870 as part of the inceptive National Society for Aid to Sick and Wounded in War, in 1905 reconstituted as the
British Red Cross
The British Red Cross Society is the United Kingdom body of the worldwide neutral and impartial humanitarian network the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. The society was formed in 1870, and is a registered charity with more ...
. She directed many practicalities for handling these donations.
Work with impoverished children in Surrey led to Senior's appointment in 1873, as an assistant inspector of workhouses. This post was given to her by
James Stansfeld
Sir James Stansfeld, (; 5 March 182017 February 1898) was a British Radical and Liberal politician and social reformer who served as Under-Secretary of State for India (1866), Financial Secretary to the Treasury (1869–71) and President of ...
, against civil service opposition. The goal of the post was a Civil Service ''Report'', which she framed as covering both pauper girls as school children, and their histories after school. When the ''Report'' appeared in 1875, the
1874 general election having intervened, it bore heavy criticism by Royal Navy senior officer Carleton Tufnell, acting in concert with ''
The Times''.
A meeting called by the Reverend Thomas Vincent Fosbery (then chaplain to Bishop Samuel Wilberforce) in May 1874, at
Lambeth Palace. It brought together Senior, Elizabeth, wife of the Very Reverend
Harold Browne
Edward Harold Browne (usually called Harold Browne; 6 March 1811 – 18 December 1891) was a bishop of the Church of England.
Early life and education
Browne was born on 6 March 1811 at Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, the second son of Robert ...
Bishop of Winchester
The Bishop of Winchester is the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Winchester in the Church of England. The bishop's seat (''cathedra'') is at Winchester Cathedral in Hampshire. The Bishop of Winchester has always held ''ex officio'' (except dur ...
,
Catharine Tait
Catharine Tait (; 9 December 1819 – 1 December 1878) was a British philanthropist.
Life
Tait was born in Elmdon near Rugby where her father was the rector. Her parents were Anna Maria and William Spooner.
She had opposed Archibald Campbell ...
, and Mary Elizabeth Townsend (1841–1918). They agreed to set up the
Girls' Friendly Society
The Girls' Friendly Society In England And Wales (or just GFS) is a charitable organisation that empowers girls and young women aged 5 to 25, encouraging them to develop their full potential through programs that provide training, confidence bu ...
, founded on 1 January 1875 so young, "wholly unblemished" servants could have a friend of a higher social class with whom to meet, read, sew, take refreshment.
Senior, with
Caroline Emelia Stephen
Caroline Emelia Stephen (8 December 1834 – 7 April 1909), also known as Milly Stephen, was a British philanthropist and a writer on Quakerism. Her niece was Virginia Woolf.
Life
Stephen was born on 8 December 1834 at Kensington Gore on Hyde Pa ...
and her cousin founded instead, the rivalling
Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants
The Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants (MABYS) was a voluntary organisation of middle- and upper-class women, which aimed to support poor young women and girls in London and encourage them to become domestic servants.
Founda ...
in 1876, to habilitate institutionalised and vulnerable girls in London. Senior had not found enough common ground with GFS's senior Anglicans who used the geographical units of the church and some of whom insisted on no hint a servant's impropriety. Instead her successful organisation sought to de-institutionalise recruits, from such places as workhouses into becoming reliable, skilled servants.
Senior, with the support of
Thomas John Barnardo, had lobbied for MABYS, and similar bodies, to be automatically made guardians until the age of 20 for any child who had been in Poor Law care for over five years.
She died of 'cancer of the womb' and exhaustion on 24 March 1877, aged 48; and is buried in
Brookwood Cemetery
Brookwood Cemetery, also known as the London Necropolis, is a burial ground in Brookwood, Surrey, England. It is the largest cemetery in the United Kingdom and one of the largest in Europe. The cemetery is listed a Grade I site in the Regis ...
in Surrey.
Associations
G. F. Watts
George Frederic Watts (23 February 1817, in London – 1 July 1904) was a British painter and sculptor associated with the Symbolist movement. He said "I paint ideas, not things." Watts became famous in his lifetime for his allegorical work ...
the artist had become a confidant of Jane Senior by the mid-1850s; they corresponded, and most of the letters have been destroyed.
Octavia Hill
Octavia Hill (3 December 1838 – 13 August 1912) was an English social reformer, whose main concern was the welfare of the inhabitants of cities, especially London, in the second half of the nineteenth century. Born into a family of radical t ...
, governess for a time to the children of Thomas Hughes, became a close friend. Senior was a friend and correspondent of the novelist
George Eliot.
In Clapham, Senior knew
Marianne Thornton
Marianne Thornton (10 March 1797 – 5 November 1887) was an English human rights activist, who campaigned for the abolition of slavery.
Marianne Thornton was the eldest of nine children of the philanthropist, economist and abolitionist Henry Tho ...
, figure of the
Clapham Sect
The Clapham Sect, or Clapham Saints, were a group of social reformers associated with Clapham in the period from the 1780s to the 1840s. Despite the label "sect", most members remained in the established (and dominant) Church of England, which ...
and daughter of
Henry Thornton, and her niece Henrietta Synnot, both of whom were involved in local schooling. Synnot became her assistant.
Caroline Stephen
Caroline Emelia Stephen (8 December 1834 – 7 April 1909), also known as Milly Stephen, was a British philanthropist and a writer on Quakerism. Her niece was Virginia Woolf.
Life
Stephen was born on 8 December 1834 at Kensington Gore on Hyde Pa ...
made a very positive impression, and was an influence for the future. In the aftermath of the "Eyre controversy", she made a point of inviting
Emelia Russell Gurney
Emelia Russell Gurney (1823–1896) was an English activist, patron and benefactor. After her marriage she was generally known as Mrs. Russell Gurney.
Life
She was born Emelia Batten, daughter of the Rev. Samuel Ellis Batten (1792–1830), mas ...
, wife of
Russell Gurney
Russell Gurney, FRS (2 September 1804 – 31 May 1878) was an English lawyer and Conservative Party politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1865 to 1878.
Life
Gurney was born at Norwood, the son of Sir John Gurney, a Baron of the Ex ...
, to show her Jamaica sketches.
In the early 1870s Senior worked with
Henrietta Rowland
Dame Henrietta Octavia Weston Barnett, DBE (''née'' Rowland; 4 May 1851 – 10 June 1936) was an English social reformer, educationist, and author. She and her husband, Samuel Augustus Barnett, founded the first "University Settlement" at Toyn ...
, teaching literacy in
Whitechapel. Another associate of this period was
Menella Bute Smedley
Menella Bute Smedley (1820–1877) was a novelist and poet. A relative of Lewis Carroll, she wrote some minor novels and books of poems, including the anonymous, ''The Story of Queen Isabel, and Other Verses'', 1863.
She translated the old German ...
, following up on girls who had left workhouse schools. For MABYS, Senior called on
Bessie Belloc
Elizabeth Rayner Belloc (; 16 June 1829 – 23 March 1925) was one of the most prominent English feminists and campaigners for women's rights in Victorian times and also a poet, essayist and journalist.
Early life
Bessie Rayner Parkes was bo ...
,
Barbara Bodichon
Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon (born Barbara Leigh Smith; 8 April 1827 – 11 June 1891) was an English educationalist and artist, and a leading mid-19th-century feminist and women's rights activist. She published her influential ''Brief Summary ...
and Mrs. Knox for support.
Family
Jane married Nassau John Senior, son of
Nassau William Senior, on 10 August 1848 at Shaw Church. Her husband was a barrister, but failed to make more than a desultory career in the law. From 1860 they lived in Elm House, a villa with a small wooded estate on
Lavender Hill
The A3036 is an A road in London, England, running from Waterloo to Wandsworth.
Route
It starts at the southern tip of the County Hall roundabout where the A302 Westminster Bridge, York Road and A23 Westminster Bridge Road all interse ...
, near
Clapham Junction
Clapham Junction is an urban locality around Clapham Junction railway station in London, England. Despite its name, it is not located in Clapham, but forms the commercial centre of Battersea.
Clapham Junction was a scene of disturbances during ...
in
Battersea
Battersea is a large district in south London, part of the London Borough of Wandsworth, England. It is centred southwest of Charing Cross and extends along the south bank of the River Thames. It includes the Battersea Park.
History
Batte ...
, south London, taking lodgers.
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The marriage was unhappy. They had a son Walter Nassau (1850–1933).
He married Mabel Barbara Hammersley, daughter of Hugh Hammersley and his mother's friend Dulcibella Eden, in 1888.
Dorothea Murray Hughes (1891–1952), daughter of Senior's brother Hastings Hughes, was a nurse and aid worker. She wrote ''Jane Elizabeth Senior: A Memoir'' (1915).
References
Sources
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External links
''Restoration of the memorial to Jane Elizabeth ("Jeanie") Senior''Walter Money, FSA
{{DEFAULTSORT:Senior, Jane
1828 births
1877 deaths
British civil servants
Deaths from uterine cancer
Burials at Brookwood Cemetery