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lt;jr room bridge auu Sons.AKemahkablb Womw.—Janet Hamilton,theShoemaker a Wira —In I860, the late Mr. John Cassell invited :the working men of the United Kingdom to become contributors ;to a monthly supplement published with the •* Working Man'sFriend and Family instructor and, to eucourAge them in sodoing, he offered various prises of books for such contributions as might be accepted, in reply to this invitation, a large number of articles, written by bonujide. working men, were sent in, to Mr, Cassell, and among these was one by a workiug wonmu*—Janet Hamilton, the wile of a working shoemaker. It was entitled “ Counteracting influences/1 and treated of the evils arising from the prevalence of intemperance. It was received too late for insertion in the first of the monthly supplements, and appeared, therefore, in one of the regular numbers of the •* Working Man s Friend/* This article was followed by various others, the clear andiorcible style of which contrasted favourably with many of the other working class articles, and occasioned some to predict a fair share oi success for the future literary efforts of theyotmc/anu rising authoress, as they deemed her to be. They little thought that when Janet Hamilton composed her first article she was upwards of fifty years of age ; or that, being unable to write even her own name, she had to learn by heart the various paragraphs of her essay, her husband or son subsequently writing them from her dictation.1 his was courting literature under difficulties ; but the powerful strain thus imposed upon her memory became, at last, utterly unbearable, and compelled her to invent a peculiar kindofcali-graphy, which was intelligible only to herself, but which she could easily read to her son, for the purpose of being transcribed into a more orthodox description of handwriting. When Janet s neighbours heard that she had beeu composing articles whick had actually appeared in print, they could scarcely believe it. Here was a woman, whose iiie had been spent in heavy labour, and who was burthened with the wearisome caresand anxieties of a numerous household, and who had, moreover, passed the prime ot life— a working woman, who had never learned to write, and whose limited income prevented her from procuring more than one or two oi the cheaper class of books, it seemed almost incredible, yet it was, nevertheless, true. Janet Hamilton, surmounting the difficulties which, from her earliest childhood, had impeded her onward progress, had shown that she was capable of better things than those to whom she was known had given her credit for. Her Ufe had always been one of busy toil. Her father was a working shoemaker, while her mother gained a livelihood by held labour or the spiuning-wheel; the twain being too poor to afford more than a single apartment, which was made to serve as a living-room, workroom, and bedroom, and in which Janet first saw the light. This was in 17b5. When Janet firsta - a k * ..Aa ft a % _ « % • • m .
Newspaper Details
Leeds Intelligencer
Leeds, West Yorkshire, GB
Sat, Feb 03, 1866
Page 6
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
UT, USA 30 Dec 2021
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