Caroline Ashurst Stansfeld

Last updated • 3 min readFrom Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia

Caroline Stansfeld
Caroline Ashurst Stansfeld.png
Portrait of Caroline Ashurst Stansfeld
Born(1816-01-28)28 January 1816
Died29 March 1885(1885-03-29) (aged 69)
Nationality English
Occupation Activist
Spouse
(m. 1844)
ChildrenJoseph James Stansfeld
Relatives William Ashurst (father)
Eliza Ann Ashurst Bardonneau (sister)
Matilda Ashurst Biggs (sister)
Emilie Ashurst Venturi (sister)

Caroline Ashurst Stansfeld ( /ˈstænsfld/ STANSS-feeld; 28 January 1816 29 March 1885) was a member of an important family of radical activists in mid-nineteenth-century England who supported causes ranging from women's suffrage to Italian unification. In 1844, she married [1] Sir James Stansfeld (1820–1898), the future MP for Halifax and preeminent political advocate for the movement to repeal the Contagious Diseases Acts. [2] She maintained a close friendship with Italian nationalist Giuseppe Mazzini, who wrote to her frequently and 1,500 of his letters to the family have been published in E.F. Richards’ collection: Letters to an English Family. [3]

Contents

Personal life

In London, on 28 January 1816, Caroline Ashurst was born to Elizabeth Brown and William Ashurst. Her siblings were William Henry Ashurst, Eliza Ann Ashurst (Bardonneau), Emilie Ashurst (Venturi) and Matilda Ashurst (Biggs). [4] She grew up in the Ashurst home in Muswell Hill. [4]

The daughters were brought up in Muswell Hill, London, in a community of 19th-century reformers and free thinkers who advocated for more equality in society including anti-slavery. Her father gave his daughters freedom "considered shocking" for those times. [4]

Caroline and James Stansfeld (1820–1898) were married in Finsbury at the South Place Chapel, on 27 July 1844, by William Johnson Fox. Although trained as a lawyer, Stansfeld worked as a brewer, owning the Swan Brewery. [4] In 1859 Stansfeld entered Parliament, when he advocated for the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts. [4]

On 19 April 1852, the couple had a son, Joseph James Stansfeld, named after Giuseppe Mazzini. [4] Mazzini considered him a godson, sending letters and books from abroad. [5]

Activism

Like her sisters and her husband, Caroline Stansfeld was active in the feminist movement from its beginnings in the 1840s. She sat on the Whittington Club's executive council for equal adult education, worked to reform prostitution laws through the Associate Institution, worked to repeal the Contagious Diseases Act, and worked closely with radical Clementia Taylor. She was actively involved in the London Society for Women's Suffrage between 1867 and 1883. She supported abolitionism and the side of the Union in the US Civil War. [4]

Stansfeld had a close relationship with Giuseppe Mazzini, the Italian revolutionary and republican. She considered him another brother almost from the time he met the Ashurst in 1844. [6] She and her husband were members and she was a fundraiser of the Society of the Friends of Italy, supporting the unification of Italy. [4] Mazzini "referred to Caroline as ‘his ministering angel’: she assisted him in a variety of capacities, helping not only with his personal and domestic affairs but aiding him with his literary work, as well as becoming involved in more dangerous activities, such as securing money and documents for Italian revolutionaries and providing secret places of refuge for them." In 1864, James Stansfeld was implicated in a plot to assassinate Napoleon III and had to leave his government post. [4]

Caroline Stansfeld also served on committees for the Ladies’ London Emancipation and the St Mary's Dispensary for Women and Children. In 1871 she served on the executive committee of the National Society for Women's Suffrage. [7] At the Isle of Wight and in London she and her husband ran a salon frequented by Giuseppe Mazzini, Richard Cobden, Eugene Oswald, Malvida Mesenbug, Mathilde Blind, Moncure Conway, and "so many bright personalities." [8]

Later years

Stanfeld's physical and mental health declined starting in 1881. She died on 29 March 1885 of a cerebral haemorrhage in her home, Stoke Lodge, Hyde Park Gate, London. [4] She is buried at St. Denys Church in Rotherfield.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Giuseppe Mazzini</span> Italian nationalist activist, politician, journalist and philosopher

Giuseppe Mazzini was an Italian politician, journalist, and activist for the unification of Italy (Risorgimento) and spearhead of the Italian revolutionary movement. His efforts helped bring about the independent and unified Italy in place of the several separate states, many dominated by foreign powers, that existed until the 19th century. An Italian nationalist in the historical radical tradition and a proponent of a republicanism of social-democratic inspiration, Mazzini helped define the modern European movement for popular democracy in a republican state.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Josephine Butler</span> English feminist and social reformer (1828–1906)

Josephine Elizabeth Butler was an English feminist and social reformer in the Victorian era. She campaigned for women's suffrage, the right of women to better education, the end of coverture in British law, the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts, the abolition of child prostitution and an end to human trafficking of young women and children into European prostitution.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Johnson Fox</span> British Unitarian minister (1786–1864)

William Johnson Fox was an English Unitarian minister, politician, and political orator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jessie White Mario</span> English (and naturalized Italian) writer and philanthropist

Jessie White Mario was an English writer and philanthropist. She is sometimes referred to as "Hurricane Jessie" in the Italian press.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Stansfeld</span> British Radical and Liberal politician and social reformer (1820–1898)

Sir James Stansfeld, 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 the Poor Law Board (1871) before being appointed the first President of the Local Government Board.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Henry Ashurst (solicitor)</span> English solicitor (1792-1855)

William Henry Ashurst (1792–1855) was an English solicitor, deeply involved in the radical politics of his time.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Orsini affair</span> 1858 assassination attempt on Napoleon III

The Orsini affair comprised the diplomatic, political and legal consequences of the "Orsini attempt" : the attempt made on 14 January 1858 by Felice Orsini, with other Italian nationalists and backed by English radicals, to assassinate Napoleon III in Paris.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aubrey House</span> Large 18th-century house in Holland Park in west London

Aubrey House is a large 18th-century detached house with two acres of gardens in the Campden Hill area of Holland Park in west London, W8. It is a private residence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Clementia Taylor</span> British suffragist (1810–1908)

Clementia Taylor was an English women's rights activist and radical.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eliza Ashurst Bardonneau</span> English translator and activist (1813-1850)

Eliza Ashurst Bardonneau was a member of an important family of radical activists in mid-nineteenth-century England and the first translator of George Sand's work into English. The family supported causes ranging from women's suffrage to Italian unification.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sophia Dobson Collet</span> English feminist freethinker

Sophia Dobson Collet was a 19th-century English feminist freethinker. She wrote under the pen name Panthea in George Holyoake's Reasoner, wrote for The Spectator and was a friend of the leading feminist Frances Power Cobbe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Matilda Hays</span> English writer, journalist and part-time actress

Matilda Mary Hays was a 19th-century English writer, journalist and part-time actress. With Eliza Ashurst, Hays translated several of George Sand's works into English. She co-founded the English Woman's Journal. Her love interests included the actress Charlotte Cushman, with whom she had a 10-year relationship, and the poet Adelaide Anne Procter.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Abolitionist Federation</span> Organisation to abolish regulated prostitution and trafficking of women.

The International Abolitionist Federation, founded in Liverpool in 1875, aimed to abolish state regulation of prostitution and fought the international traffic in women in prostitution. It was originally called the British and Continental Federation for the Abolition of Prostitution.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Matilda Ashurst Biggs</span>

Matilda Ashurst Biggs was a member of the notable 19th-century British family of reformers, the Ashursts. Their circle of radicals was nicknamed the "Muswell Hill Brigade" after the family homestead. Alongside her family, Matilda Biggs promoted progressive domestic and foreign causes, especially working for women's equality in Britain and Italian unification.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elizabeth Ashurst Biggs</span> English Victorian-era novelist and activist

Elizabeth Ashurst Biggs was an English novelist and advocate for women's rights and anti-slavery.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arethusa Gibson</span> English Liberal activist and feminist

Susannah Arethusa Gibson was an English Liberal activist and feminist of the 19th century, who variously supported Giuseppe Mazzini and the unification of Italy, mesmerism and spiritualism, and opposed the Roman Catholic Church until joining it in later life. She was married to Thomas Milner Gibson, a leading campaigner for free trade.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Caroline Ashurst Biggs</span>

Caroline Ashurst Biggs was an advocate for women’s rights and a third generation member of the Ashurst family of radical activists. Born in Leicester on 23 August 1840, she was the second child of Matilda Ashurst Biggs and Joseph Biggs. She died at 19 Notting Hill Square in London on 4 September 1889. At the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893, her photograph was included in an exhibition of Portraits of Eminent British Women, in a section devoted to Pioneers in Philanthropy and General Advancement of Women.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Emilie Ashurst Venturi</span>

Emilie Ashurst (Hawkes) Venturi was an artist, writer, and activist who pushed for reforms in nineteenth-century Britain. She was the primary English translator of the works of Giuseppe Mazzini, the renowned Italian intellectual, and his devoted disciple. She corresponded with Mazzini, the Italian revolutionary Giuseppe Garibaldi, the artist James McNeill Whistler, the poet Algernon Charles Swinburne, the activist Josephine Butler, and the Irish politician John Dillon. She also painted portraits and published essays, translations, and some fiction. She and her first husband, Sidney Milnes Hawkes (1821-1905), separated in 1854. After her divorce was granted in 1861, she married the Italian patriot Carlo Venturi and became known as Madame Venturi. Their marriage ended with Carlo’s sudden death from a stroke. She also published as E.A.V and Edward Lovel. She belonged to a family, the Ashursts, who agitated for reforms across three generations and were the central figures in the "Muswell Hill Brigade".

Maude Ashurst Biggs born Maude Biggs was a British translator and Polish nationalist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Shaen</span> British radical and lawyer

WilliamShaen was a British radical and lawyer. An active supporter of women's education, he helped to found Bedford College, London.

References

  1. Gleadle, Kathryn. "Caroline Stansfeld". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press.
  2. On Stansfeld's important political career see J.L. Hammond and Barbara Hammond, James Stansfeld: A Victorian Champion of Sex Equality (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1932).
  3. E. F. Richards. Mazzini's Letters to an English Family., 3 vols. New York: John Lane, 1920–22.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Kathryn Gleadle (2004). "Caroline Ashurst Stansfeld". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press. Retrieved 23 June 2013.
  5. For example, see E. F. Richards, ed., Mazzini's Letters to an English Family 1861–1872 vol III (London: John Lane, 1922), 34, 39, 141, 195, 211.
  6. Allison Scardino Belzer, “Three Generations of Unconventional Family Values: A Case Study of the Ashursts” Journal of Victorian Culture 20.1 (March 2015), 2.
  7. Elizabeth Crawford, ed., The Women's Suffrage Movement: A Reference Guide, 1866–1928 (London: UCL Press, 1999), 652.
  8. Eugene Oswald, Reminiscences of a Busy Life (London: Alexander Moring, 1911), 347.