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Elizabeth Fry (1780-1845)
Elizabeth Fry was a Quaker minister who started visiting Newgate women's prison in London. This was an appalling place, overcrowded, filthy and degrading. There were also a lot of children in there as well. She reformed the prison replacing the chaos with order and hopelessness with self respect. She organized bible studies and made bibles available to those who wanted them.
Elizabeth Fry also changed the treatment of prisoners being transported to Botany Bay and set up organizations to care for them when they were in Australia. She worked tirelessly on behalf of those women who were condemned to death, trying to get their death sentence reprieved and dealing with their distress. For more than twenty years this work continued, based simply on her response to what God had done for her.
However her life changed again when, in 1820, a homeless child was found frozen to death on her doorstep. She set up nightly shelters for the homeless, opened schools, started hospital reforms and began training nurses.
This was all in addition to caring for her own family of ten children!