Representative women of New England/Sarah B. T. Capron
SARAH BROWN CAPRON was born in Lanesboro, Mass., April 24, 1828. Her name until her marriage was Sarah Brown Hooker. Her paternal grandfather was Thomas Hooker, of Rutland, Vt., who was a lineal descendant of Thomas Hooker of Connecticut. Her grandmother, Mrs. Sarah Brown Hooker, was a daughter of Lieutenant Colonel John Brown, of Pittsfield, Mass., who retired from the army because he distrusted Benedict Arnold, but who afterward died in service at Stone Arabia, in New York, in 1780. Her father was the Rev. Henry Brown Hooker, D.D., a minister of the Congregational church in Lanesboro, afterward in Falmouth, Mass., greatly honored and beloved. He was a member of the State Board of Education, receiving his appointment from Governor George N. Briggs. His last work was as the secretary of the Massachusetts Home Missionary Society, where he was engaged up to the close of a useful life. Her mother, whose maiden name was Martha Vinal Chickering, resided in Boston before marriage.
Miss Hooker's education was received in Wheaton Seminary, Norton, Mass., and in the State Normal School at West Newton. In her vacations she taught two sununer terms and two winter terms in the district schools of Falmouth, on Cape Cod. The State Normal School was then in charge of Eben S. Stearns, the well-known and loved Electa N. Lincoln, now Mrs. George A. Walton, being the able assistant. Nathaniel T. Allen, afterward long identified with the Classical School of West Newton, was the principal of the Model School, and the pupils of those days well remember his generous estimate of their abilities as they passed under his three weeks' training. Lucretia Crocker was then a student at the Normal School, giving promise of the efficiency which afterward distinguished her official career. Graduating in November, 1850, Miss Hooker was elected first assistant in the Oliver High School, Lawrence, Mass., T. W. T. Curtis being principal and George A. Walton master of the Grammar school in the same building. Miss Hooker afterward became an assistant in the Hartford High School, remaining until April, 1854. She was married October 1, 1856, to the Rev. William Banfield Capron, of Uxbridge, Mass. They were appointed as missionaries of the American Board to Madura, South India, and sailed in an ice ship for Madras, November 21, the .voyage taking one hundred days. On ar- riving in Madura Mrs. Capron, was put in charge of the Madura Girls' Boarding School, now well known in the Madras Pre.sidency as the Madura Girls' Training and High School. Mr. Capron during this time was building a house in Mana Madura, thirty miles ilistant, to which they removed in 1864, the lady in charge of the Girls' School having returned from her furlough in America. Mrs. Capron's previous service was the prehule to the various forms of educational work of which she had charge until 1886, with the exception of one furlough of two years, from 1872 to 1874.
The work of a foreign miss'onary naturally resolves itself into two lines. There is the care for the planting, growth, and development of the Christian community. This should be self-propagating and self-sustaining, and to this end should all training be directed. There is also the endeavor to uplift all those within one's sphere of influence. The first step in the for- mer lies in the little day schools in the villages, planned to give instruction to the children of Christians; but these in all cases will include many more who are drawn by the attractiveness of a school so differently conducted from the sing-song drone of the ordinary school-master of India. When it is considered that each station in charge of a resident missionary comprises from thirty to one hundred villages, in which are these schools, it will be seen that the missionary becomes a superintendent of schools. It is a gala day, indeed, when the missionary lady comes to inspect the school. On such occasions there is the selection of the clever boy or bright girl, whether from a Christian family or not, to come to the next stage in this educational scheme.
Station boarding-schools are at the station of the resident missionary, and his wife is in charge. Here are the best pupils from all the villages, numbering sometimes even a hundred. Selections from these pass on to the girls' high and training-school at the central station, and also to the high school and normal school, or college for the boys. The theological school completes the equipment.
Not included in the above, we find the Hindu girls' day schools and the Anglo-vernacular day schools for boys, both of which receive pupils who are shut out from the boarding-schools on account of caste, yet are eager for education. Attachments formed in these schools have proved in after years helpful and delightful. Many of the boys pass on into government colleges, and later, becoming officials under the English government, never forget the teaching and influence of the missionary lady who touclu^d their lives in younger days.
In October, 1876, in the midst of these ac- tivities added to all that ilevolves upon the missionary himself, Mr. Capron was suddenly called to higher service above. A graduate of Yale College and of Andover Theological Semi- nary and for a number of years principal of the Hopkins Grammar School at Hartford, Conn., before its union with the high school, he was well equipped for his life work. Accurate in business methods, of rare judgment and sym- pathetic nature, he was greatly endeared to his associates. Won by his unfailing kindliness of manner, the Hindu comnumity revered him. He originated and established the Madura Widows' Aid Society, which is a lasting monu- ment.
In 1876 Mrs. Capron removed to the city of Madura to superintend the work for women and girls. Here she remained for ten years, or until her return to America. There were three day schools for Hindu girls, and another was soon added. These four schools provided for nearly four hundred girls of the higher castes a blessed retreat from the aimlessness and ig norance of their homes. The government of India provides generously for the education of girls, as the Results Grants yearly examina- tions bring funds to be added to the allowance from America. Three masters and twelve school-mistresses were in charge. In place of a rented, uncomfortable room a new building was provided for one of these schools in the midst of Bralmiin homes. The famous temple covering fourteen and a half acres with its massive architecture and nine pagodas had its band of mvisic for the little goddess within sound of the songs of the girls. Theirs was a sweeter melody, and more stopped to listen than ever gave heed to the noisy bang of the temple performers. High, cool, antl airy, with a court-yard attractive with ferns and creepers, it became a resting-place for the women, who enjoyed seeing the variety of school life. Phillips Brooks, on entering it during his tour in India, surveyed the lines of one hundred girls in their gay clothing and jewels. With a bright smile he said, "And this is a piece of Boston!" So foreign was it to the sights in that great city.
While having the oversight of these schools, Mrs. Capron felt the claim of the women upon educational effort imperative. No such pro- vision as the Hindu girls' day schools having been made for the mothers in their girlhood days, they wished that they too might learn to read. Hence arose a demand for teachers in the homes. For a woman to be seen going about the streets and entering houses of tho.se not her relations was not consonant with Hindu ideals. There being in those earlier days no suitable women as teachers except those trained in mission schools, these were constrained by the example of the lady missionary to lay aside custom and give their services to those who were so ready to receive, and, having taught the primer, they next gave them the Bible. Since in many homes they read from the Bible to those who did not care to learn, but were glad to listen, they were called Bible wonvm. There were three of these teachers, or readers, and thirty women under instruction. Their number increased to twelve, the number learn- ing to read to nine hundred and fifty. The superintendence of these added to her own visits in the homes was a work full of interest to Mrs. Capron.
A room in the dispensary was given to Mrs. Capron, where women and children coming for medical treatment might- gather. Coming to India before the days of medical education for women, but having a liking for the work, under the leadership of the enthusiastic Dr. Etlward Chester, she gave two hours each morning to writing such prescriptions as were within her ability. Desiring to add something if possil:)le to render her service in this line more valuable, she spent six weeks in 1875 in the Government Hospital in Madras, where the physician in charge kindly afforded without limitations such advantages as she most de- sired. A woman physician is one of the most potent factors in the emancipation of the women of India from the fetters of superstition and cruelty. "I do not expect to be cured," said a Brahmin woman who had walked three miles, " but I wanted to hear the kind words and feel the pity."
During the fearful famine of 1877-78, when five millions of the people in the Madras Presi- dency and the Deccan perished, Mrs. Capron received for a year and a half a monthly grant from the Mansion House fund, London, for famine relief. The tremendous demand upon one in the midst of such misery must be experienced to be understood. Generous con- tributions from America came as timely allevi- ation to those who long gratefully remembered the ministry.
One day, as Mrs. Cilpron was threading her way in antl out among the bundles of grass brought for sale by the women who were sitting beside them, she overheard one say to another, "Who is she?" "Don't you know?" was the reply, "she is the mother "of the city." Her conveyance and white bullocks had been in every street, and had stood at the head of many a lane. She could always see, in the crowds through which she was passing, recognition if not salutation. She had been often told of the merit she was laying up, with fawning flattery called a (jueen, and that it was a goo(_l deed to bring one more religion to add to the many; but the outspoken testimony of the humble coolie woman was the unlooked-for response to the love for the women of India.
In 1886, at the railway station in Madura, when she was leaving the country, a Brahmin gentleman, followed by a servant bearing a large brass tray, made his way through the crowd, and, coming to the window of the car where Mrs. Capron was sitting, asked her to come to the platform. Placing an enormous wreath of buds of the white jessamine with touches of pink oleander u))on her shoulders, he said, "I bring to you this as a token of the regard of our families for what you have done for the women of our city."
Not to be ministered unto but to minister, to be enshrined in the lives of many, a memory which neither time nor distance can touch, is ever the sphere attainable by all who seek it. Arriving in America, Mrs. Capron found her time fully taken in addresses upon India and its people and its needs. Articles written for publication and Bible study with resultant class work also had their share of attention. In 1889 Mr. D. L. Moody, about to open in Chicago the Moody Bible Institute, a training- school for home and foreign missions, asked Mrs. Capron to become superintendent of the women's department. When she questioned her fitness for the position, " It is the experience of life that I want," was his reply. The results from his far-sighted plan have verified his expectations: many young men have received that which was available in no other way. Young women who were desiring to enter church and city work were trained to know how sympathetically and tactfully to find their way into the homes and hearts of those who were weighted with the burdens of poverty and drunkenness, and by gracious and loving words to kindle hope and courage. Candidates for foreign missionary work and ladies at home on furlough from foreign fields found that which was valuable for the future. Grateful expressions of conmendation are coming from all over the world and from ministers and superintendents in this country, where the services of these trained workers have proved of value.
Mrs. Capron resigned her position in Chicago in 1894, and has since resided in Boston with her sister, Mrs. Arthur W. Tufts. Her children are: Annie Hooker Capron, now Mrs. Lewis Kennedy Morse, of Boston, Mass.; and Laura Elisabeth Capron, now Mrs. James Dyer Keith, of Poughkeepsie, N.Y. Mr. and Mrs. Morse have two children: Anna Hooker, born April 5, 1899; and Arthur Webster, born March 9, 1900. Mr. and Mrs. Keith have two children: James Monroe, born March 7, 1893; and Annie Hooker, born June 29, 1895.