Maria Susan Rye, (31 March 1829 – 12 November 1903), was a social reformer and a promoter of emigration from England, especially of young women living in Liverpool
workhouse
In Britain, a workhouse () was an institution where those unable to support themselves financially were offered accommodation and employment. (In Scotland, they were usually known as poorhouses.) The earliest known use of the term ''workhouse' ...
s, to the colonies of the
British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts e ...
, especially Canada.
Early life
She was born at 2 Lower James Street,
Golden Square
Golden Square, in Soho, the City of Westminster, London, is a mainly hardscaped garden square planted with a few mature trees and raised borders in Central London flanked by classical office buildings. Its four approach ways are north and sou ...
, in
central London, on 31 March 1829. She was the eldest of the nine children of
Edward Rye
Edward Rye was an English landowner with property in Doncaster.
He was the eldest son of Brian Rye of Whitwell and his wife, Jane Eyre. The family lands at Whitwell, Derbyshire were sold to Richard Whalley (1499–1583), who had been a noted su ...
, solicitor and bibliophile, and Maria Tuppen. Edward Rye of
Baconsthorpe, Norfolk, was her grandfather. Of her brothers,
Edward Caldwell Rye was an entomologist, and
Walter Rye
Walter Rye (31 October 1843 – 24 February 1929) was a British athlete and antiquary, who wrote over 80 works on Norfolk.
Early life
Walter Rye was born on 31 October 1843 in Chelsea, London. He was the seventh child of Edward Rye, a solicitor ...
, solicitor, antiquary, and athlete, published works on
Norfolk history and topography and was
mayor of Norwich in 1908–9.
Maria Rye received her education at home and read for herself in the large library of her father.
Career
Coming under the influence of
Charles Kingsley's father, then vicar of
St Luke's Church, she devoted herself at the age of sixteen to parochial work
in Chelsea. She was impressed by the lack of opportunity of employment for women outside the teaching profession. In succession to
Mary Howitt
Mary Howitt (12 March 1799-30 January 1888) was an English poet, the author of the famous poem '' The Spider and the Fly''. She translated several tales by Hans Christian Andersen. Some of her works were written in conjunction with her husband, ...
, she soon became secretary of
Langham Place, London#The Langham Place Group which promoted the
Married Women's Property bill, which was brought forward by Sir
Thomas Erskine Perry
Sir Thomas Erskine Perry (20 July 1806 – 22 April 1882) was a British Liberal politician and judge in India. After serving as chief justice of the supreme court in Bombay and as a Member of Parliament in Britain, he served as a member of the C ...
in 1856 but was not fully passed
till 1882.
Rye joined the
Society for Promoting the Employment of Women
The Society for Promoting the Employment of Women (SPEW) was one of the earliest British women's organisations.
The society was established in 1859 by Jessie Boucherett, Barbara Bodichon and Adelaide Anne Proctor to promote the training and emplo ...
on its foundation, but, disapproving of the
women's franchise movement which the leading members supported, soon left it. In 1859, she undertook a private law-stationer's business at 12 Portugal Street,
Lincoln's Inn, in order to give employment to middle-class girls. At the same time, she helped to establish the
Victoria Press
The Victoria Press was a printing press started by Emily Faithfull, along with other feminist activists, in London, on March 26, 1860. The press, named after Queen Victoria, was created as a way to allow more women into the printing field. In 1867 ...
in association with her business in 1860 (under the charge of
Emily Faithfull
Emily Faithfull (27 May 1835 – 31 May 1895) was an English women's rights activist who set up the Victoria Press to publish the '' English Woman's Journal''.
Biography
Emily Faithfull was born on 27 May 1835 at Headley Rectory, Surrey. She w ...
), and the
employment bureau and telegraph school in Great Coram Street, with
Isa Craig as secretary. The telegraph school anticipated the employment of girls as telegraph clerks.
The law-stationer's business prospered, but the applications for employment were far in excess of the demands of the concern. With
Jane Lewin, she consequently raised a fund for assisting middle-class girls to emigrate, and to the question of emigration she devoted the rest of her life.
Emigration
She founded, in 1861, the
Female Middle Class Emigration Society (absorbed since 1884 in the
United British Women's Emigration Association). Between 1860 and 1868, she was instrumental in sending girls of the middle class and domestic servants to Australia, New Zealand, and Canada. She visited these colonies to form committees for the protection of the emigrants.
Together with several governesses and over 100 women traveling in steerage, Rye sailed to New Zealand in 1863. There in
Dunedin
Dunedin ( ; mi, Ōtepoti) is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand (after Christchurch), and the principal city of the Otago region. Its name comes from , the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. Th ...
, she found the terrible conditions in which immigrant single women had been housed -- former military barracks with few amenities. She became the center of political and philanthropic controversies as she sought for reform from the provincial government's immigration offices. Within two years, she had traveled across New Zealand and found few opportunities for skilled, educated single women. Even in the more settled Canterbury region, Rye realized the scheme was not going to work since the local populace emphasized their need for domestic servants or marriageable farmhands.
From 1868, when she handed over her law business to Lewin, Rye devoted herself exclusively to the emigration of pauper children, or, in a phrase which she herself coined, 'gutter children.' After visiting in New York the
Little Wanderers' Home for the training of derelict children for emigrant life which Mr. Van Meter, a Baptist minister from Ohio, had founded, she resolved to give the system a trial in London. Encouraged by
Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury
Anthony Ashley Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury (28 April 1801 – 1 October 1885), styled Lord Ashley from 1811 to 1851, was a British Tory politician, philanthropist, and social reformer. He was the eldest son of The 6th Earl of Shaftesbury ...
and ''The Times'' newspaper and with the financial support of
William Rathbone VI
William Rathbone VI (11 February 1819 – 6 March 1902) was an English merchant and businessman noted for his philanthropic and public work. He was an English Liberal politician who sat in the House of Commons variously between 1868 and 1895.
...
, M.P., in 1869 she purchased Avenue House, High Street, Peckham, and with her two younger sisters, in spite of public opposition and prejudice, took there from the streets or the workhouses waifs and strays from the ages of three to sixteen. Fifty girls from Kirkdale
industrial school, Liverpool, were soon put under her care ; they were trained in
domestic economy
Home economics, also called domestic science or family and consumer sciences, is a subject concerning human development, personal and family finances, consumer issues, housing and interior design, nutrition and food preparation, as well as texti ...
and went through courses of general and religious instruction.
At
Niagara,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
, Rye also acquired a building which she called 'Our Western Home.' It was opened on 1 December 1869. To this house Miss Rye drafted the children from
Peckham, and after further training they were distributed in Canada as domestic servants among respectable families. The first party left England in October 1869. She received a
civil list pension
Pensions in the United Kingdom, whereby United Kingdom tax payers have some of their wages deducted to save for retirement, can be categorised into three major divisions - state, occupational and personal pensions.
The state pension is based on ...
of £10 in 1871.
Poor law children were subsequently received at Peckham from
St. George's, Hanover Square
St George's, Hanover Square, is an Anglican church, the parish church of Mayfair in the City of Westminster, central London, built in the early eighteenth century as part of a project to build fifty new churches around London (the Queen Anne C ...
, Wolverhampton, Bristol, Reading, and other towns. By 1891 Rye had found homes in Canada for some five hundred children. She accompanied each batch of emigrants, and visited the children already settled there. The work was continued with great success for over a quarter of a century, and did much to diminish the vicious habits and the stigma of pauperism. Lord Shaftesbury remained a consistent supporter, and in 1884
Henry Petty-Fitzmaurice, 5th Marquess of Lansdowne
Henry Charles Keith Petty-Fitzmaurice, 5th Marquess of Lansdowne, (14 January 18453 June 1927), was a British statesman who served successively as Governor General of Canada, Viceroy of India, Secretary of State for War and Secretary of State f ...
, then
governor-general of Canada
The governor general of Canada (french: gouverneure générale du Canada) is the federal viceregal representative of the . The is head of state of Canada and the 14 other Commonwealth realms, but resides in oldest and most populous realm, ...
, warmly commended the results of her pioneer system, which
Thomas John Barnardo
Thomas John Barnardo (4 July 184519 September 1905) was an Irish-born philanthropist and founder and director of homes for poor and deprived children. From the foundation of the first Barnardo's home in 1867 to the date of Barnardo's death, ne ...
and others subsequently adopted and extended.
Later life
In 1895, owing to the continuous strain, Rye transferred the two institutions in Peckham and Niagara with their funds to the Church of England Waifs and Strays Society (now
The Children's Society
The Children's Society, formally the Church of England Children's Society, is a United Kingdom national children's charity (registered No. 221124) allied to the Church of England.
The charity's two governing objectives are to:
# directly improv ...
). In her farewell report of 1895 she stated that 4000 English and Scottish children then in Canada had been sent out from her home in England.
She retired with her sister Elizabeth to 'Baconsthorpe,'
Hemel Hempstead
Hemel Hempstead () is a town in the Dacorum district in Hertfordshire, England, northwest of London, which is part of the Greater London Urban Area. The population at the 2011 census was 97,500.
Developed after the Second World War as a new ...
, where she spent the remainder of her life. There she died, after four years' suffering, of intestinal cancer on 12 November 1903, and was buried in the churchyard.
See Also
*
Barbara Leigh Smith 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 Summar ...
*
Bessie Rayner Parkes
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 b ...
*
The Langham Place Group
*
Society for Promoting the Employment of Women
The Society for Promoting the Employment of Women (SPEW) was one of the earliest British women's organisations.
The society was established in 1859 by Jessie Boucherett, Barbara Bodichon and Adelaide Anne Proctor to promote the training and emplo ...
References
Further reading
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*
Attribution
External links
Biography at the ''Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online''Female Middle Class Emigration Society, '' Women's Library '', Appendix 1.4''British Home Child Group International''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rye, Maria Susan
English social justice activists
1829 births
1903 deaths
English women activists
English philanthropists
British social reformers
Child welfare in the United Kingdom
Child welfare in Canada
History of women in Canada
19th-century British philanthropists