Catherine Mulgrave
Catherine Mulgrave was born in Luanda, Angola, circa 1827. Some scholars such as Swiss German church historian, Hans Werner Debrunner posited that Mulgrave may have been born earlier in around 1825 or in 1826. Other records list 1820 and 1822. However, records at the "Basel Mission Archives" list her exact date of birth as 19 November 1827. Her father was a prince, the son of an African traditional chief who worked as an assistant to a merchant in their port town. Other sources state that her father was a respected African Christian merchant with European influences. Her mother, Sophina was a baptised mulatress who belonged to a Christian family of Catholic origin – most likely Euro-African of Portuguese and indigenous African descent. Since the 15th century, circa 1450, the Portuguese had a long-established presence on the Angolan coast through commerce and trade with BaKongo Empire. Mulgrave recalled her mother calling her by the Angolan name "“Gewe”" (pronounced ""Geve"") as a child. It is said that her European maternal grandfather had his entire family, including his elen daughters, one son and grandchildren, both Portuguese and African, vaccinated against smallpox. The port town of Luanda was described as, "“A seaside town with a large church, a school, two forts, great European houses. (...) The city itself has a governor, a bishop, monks various cowls, vestments, choirboys, images of saints, holy water."" When she was about five years old in April 1833, Gewe and her two cousins, while playing and fishing on the beach one early evening, were abducted by Portuguese slave traders on the coast of São Paulo da Assunção de Loanda, now Luanda. The slave traders arrived in a small boat with some sailors and attempted to lure the three children with sweets. One child managed to run away before she could be captured into the boat. The sailors paddled their boat to an anchored slave ship nearby, the "Heroina" where the two girls were greeted by a friendly captain, "Sabin from St. Thomas" who was also a slave trader. The two girl prisoners were kept in the captain's cabin. Hundreds of captives, estimated to be about 303, were in the ship and the two girls witnessed the brutality visited upon prisoners who tried to break free. That night, the ship sailed from the Angolan coast, heading for Havana, Cuba. After a few weeks, land came into view. British colonial authorities patrolling the high seas inspected the ship but they did not discover the slaves who were hidden in a basement. Near the southern Jamaican coast, a tropical storm alarmed and distressed everyone aboard the Portuguese schooner - the vessel crushed against a rock and began leaking before it eventually sunk. Some swam to safety on the shore while others clung to the wooden mast while they waited to be rescued. Gewe and her cousin were among the few survivors rescued from the wreckage and taken to Old Harbour, Saint Catherine Jamaica. The captain of the ship with his crew of kidnappers were arrested by the British authorities in Jamaica and jailed in Kingston as the system of slavery was already in the early phase of abolishment. The "apprenticeship act", granting immediate and full freedom to children six years of age and younger, and an intermediate status for those older, was also enacted 1833, kicking off the step-by-step abolishment of the system of slavery in Jamaica. The surviving captives aboard the Portuguese vessel were set free. Earlier in 1831/32, a bloody slave rebellion on the island had kicked off the struggle towards freedom. The official Act of Emancipation came into full force throughout the West Indies on 1 August 1834.
The two girls were adopted by the then Governor of Jamaica between 1832 and 1834, Earl of Mulgrave (1797–1863) and his wife, Maria Liddell, Lady Mulgrave Maria Liddell (1798–1882) who later became Lady Normanby and had just returned from Britain on a short trip. The Earl of Mulgrave was created Marquess of Normanby in 1835 and was styled as Constantine Henry Phipps, 1st Marquess of Normanby. The Mulgraves gave the two girls their surname and Gewe was given her adoptive mother's name.. In the first few months at the Governor's official residence in Spanish Town, they were home-schooled by the Governor's wife who was a devout Christian, most likely of Anglican faith. In 1833, the Earl and Lady Mulgrave were on an official visit to inspect the "Female Refuge School" in Fairfield, Manchester Parish. Between 1831 and 1837, the Moravian Church in Jamaica and the Cayman Islands increased its general operations in evangelism and educational initiatives in the West Indies. The Moravians sought to educate liberated slaves under the apprenticeship system. The refuge school had been established a year earlier in 1832 by English Moravian women missionaries. The school population had 24 orphan girls, who came from all over the island to attend the institution. Catherine Mulgrave and her cousin were sent to the boarding school. She spent five and a half years at the girls’ school. In January 1834, the Governor and Lady Mulgrave left Jamaica. They had wished to take Catherine and her cousin with them, but Lady Mulgrave suffered from sporadic illness and upon medical advice, the Mulgraves decided to leave them in Jamaica. Furthermore, the Clerk of the Mulgraves advised them against taking Catherine to England due to climatic conditions. They nonetheless maintained correspondence with Catherine and regularly remitted funds for her upkeep in Jamaica. After separation from her Victorian aristocratic foster family, Catherine Mulgrave was taken in by the Moravian mission in Fairfield, Manchester Parish. Catherine Mulgrave then proceeded to the Mico Institution in Kingston, Jamaica for teacher-training. Persistent illness forced her to leave the normal school after just nine months.
Catherine Hunt
Dame Catherine Reeve Hunt ("née" Hawkins; 22 December 1854 – 18 October 1948) was an English politician and activist who was mayor of Colchester, Essex, in 1924–25.