Mary Frances Heaton
In 1837, aged in her 30s, Doncaster-born Mary was committed to an asylum. She had caused a disturbance during a church service by demanding to be paid for music lessons she had delivered to the local preacher’s daughter.
According to the Forgotten Women researchers, in one of the surviving samplers, stitched by Mary before her time in the asylum, she writes: “I wish the vicar would submit to arbitration my claim against him for music lessons given to his daughter, regularly, twice a week, during the years 1834 and 1835.”
It would appear he had refused to pay Mary for her services, and so denied any opportunity for negotiation on the matter, she called him out in public – which led to her being labled dangerous and “insane”.
“Speaking out, getting excited, challenging male authority and refusing to conform would quickly be used as evidence of insanity,” our researchers note.” These kinds of actions were seen as ‘irrational’.”
Mary stayed at the institution until she was transferred to an asylum in South Yorkshire in 1873.
Mary’s Blue Plaque can be found on the old Clock Tower at the original hospital site, now known as Stanley Royd.
Mary is Blue Plaque number 15 in our quest for #BluePlaqueParity.
We unveiled Mary’s blue plaque as part of the Suppressed Suffragist Exhibition supporting the Unfinished Business Exhibition from London Library September 2020 at Wakefield Library.
Mary Frances Heaton Broadsheets
Find out all about Mary and her hardships and quiet forms of resistance with our broadsheets below. Just click on broadsheet page you wish to read and then double click to zoom in and read at your leisure. Please contact us if you require the text in a different format.
Artistic Expression Based on Mary's Story
FWW are proud partners of Stitched Up Theatre based in Brighton whom have ceaselessly worked in the most amazingly creative ways to celebrate and break the hearts of the public with their opera about Miss H.
Click the logo below to watch the Miss H Opera trailer!
Listen to “The Unravelling Fantasia of Miss H” Audio Play here!
Mary's Blue Plaque Unveiling
Press & Media Links
The Guardian: Blue plaque to honour Yorkshirewoman who was locked in asylum for calling vicar a liar
Yorkshire Post: 19th century Yorkshire woman was deemed ‘insane’ and sent to West Riding Pauper Lunatic Asylum in Wakefield after requesting to be paid
Wikipedia: Mary Frances Heaton
The Arts Cafe, Wakefield: Mary Frances Heaton
Humanities Chat Blog: Mary Frances Heaton: Embroidery and the Insane
Disability Arts Online: Connected By Threads: How generations of disabled women artists have found a voice through textiles