“Two men I honour and no third. First the toilworn craftsman that with earth-made Implement laboriously conquers the earth and makes her man’s.... A second man I honour, and still more highly: Him who is seen toiling for the spiritually indispensable; not daily bread, but the bread of Life.... Unspeakably touching is it however when I find both dignities united; and he that must toil outwardly for the lowest of man’s wants, is also toiling inwardly for the highest. Sublimer in this world know I nothing than the Peasant Saint, could such now anywhere be met with. Such a one will take thee back to Nazareth itself; thou wilt see the splendour of Heaven spring forth from the humblest depths of Earth, like a light shining in great darkness.”—Sartor Resartus, pp. 157, 158.

Every one of us has probably been tempted at one time or another to say or think when asked to join in some good work, “If only I had more time or more money, I would take it up.” It is good for us, therefore, to be reminded that neither leisure nor wealth are necessary to those whose hearts are fixed upon the earnest desire to leave this world a little better and a little happier than they found it.

This lesson was wonderfully taught by Sarah Martin, a poor dressmaker, who was born at Caister, near Great Yarmouth, in 1791. In her own locality she did as great a work in solving the problems of prison discipline, and how to improve the moral condition of prisoners, as Mrs. Fry was doing about the same time upon a larger scale in London. It is very extraordinary that this poor woman, who was almost entirely self-educated, and who was dependent on daily toil for daily bread, should have been able, through her own mother-wit and native goodness of heart, to see the evil and provide the same remedies for it as were in course of time provided throughout the land, as the result of study given to the subject, by statesmen, philosophers, and philanthropists.

When Sarah Martin first began to visit the prison at Great Yarmouth, there was no sort of provision for the moral or educational improvement of the prisoners. There was no chaplain, there were no religious services, there was no school, and there was no employment of any kind, except what Satan finds for idle hands to do. The quiet, little, gentle-voiced dressmaker changed all this.

She was first led to visit the prison in 1819, through the compassionate horror which filled her when she heard of the committal to prison of a woman for brutally ill-treating her child. Without any introduction or recommendation from influential persons, she knocked timidly at the gate of the prison, and asked leave to see this woman. She had not told a single human creature of her intention, not even her grandmother, with whom she lived. She was fearful lest she should be overcome by the counsels of worldly wisdom that she had better mind her own business, that the woman’s wickedness was no concern of hers, and so forth. Her first application at the gaol was unsuccessful; but she tried again, and the second time she was admitted without any question whatever. Once in the presence of the prisoner, the first inquiry by which she was met was a somewhat rough one as to the object of her visit. When the poor creature heard and felt all the deep compassion which had moved Sarah Martin to her side, she burst into tears, and with many expressions of contrition and gratitude besought her visitor to help her to be a better woman.

From the date of this visit, the best energies of Sarah Martin’s life were devoted to improving the lot of the prisoners in Great Yarmouth Gaol. She did not—indeed, she could not—give up her dressmaking. She worked out at her customers’ houses, earning about 1s. 3d. a day. Her first resolve was to give up always one day a week to her prison work, and as many other days as she could spare. She began teaching the prisoners to read and write; she also read to them, and told them stories. A deeply religious woman herself, it pained her that there were no services of any kind in the prison, and she prevailed upon the prisoners to gather together on Sunday mornings and read to one another. To encourage them in this she attended herself, not at first as the conductor of the service, but as a fellow-worshipper. This was very typical of her method and character. She was among them as one who served, not as one seeking power and authority. Another illustration of this sweet humility in her character may be given. She wished those of her pupils who could read to learn each day a few Bible texts; and she always learned some herself, and said them with the prisoners. Sometimes an objection was made. In her own words, “Many said at first, ‘It would be of no use,’ and my reply was, ‘It is of use to me, and why should it not be so to you? You have not tried it, but I have.’” There was a simplicity in this, a complete absence of the “Depart from me, for I am holier than thou,” which was irresistible, and always silenced excuse.

Soon after the commencement of the Sunday services in the prison, it was found necessary, through the difficulty of finding a reader, that Sarah Martin herself should conduct the service. At first she used to read a sermon from a book, but later she wrote her own sermons, and later still she was able to preach without writing beforehand. According to the testimony of Captain Williams, the Inspector of Prisons for the district, the whole service was in a high degree reverent and impressive. The prisoners listened with deep attention to the clear, melodious voice of their self-appointed pastor.

At no time did she seek to obtain from the governor of the prison any authority over the prisoners; that is, she never sought to control them against their will; authority over them she had, but it was the authority which proceeded from her own personal influence. The prisoners did what she wished, because they knew her devotion to them. Her hold over them is best proved by the fact that never but once did she meet from them with anything that could be called rudeness or insult.

Next to her care for godliness and education, her chief thoughts were given to provide employment for the prisoners, first for the women, and then for the men. A gentleman gave her 10s., and in the same week another gave her £1. Her gratitude for the possession of this small capital is touching to read of. She expended it in the purchase of materials for baby-clothes, and borrowing patterns, she set the women to work upon making little shifts and wrappers. The garments, when completed, were sold for the benefit of the women who had made them.

Her capital grew from thirty shillings to seven guineas, and in all more than £400 worth of clothing, made in this way, was sold. The advantages were twofold. First, the women were employed and taught to sew, and secondly, each woman was enabled to earn a small sum, which was saved for her till the time of her release from prison. This money was frequently the means of giving the discharged prisoner a chance of starting a new life and gaining an honest livelihood.

Sarah Martin gave particular attention to this very important branch of her work. A man or a woman just out of prison, branded with all the stigma and disgrace of the gaol, is too often almost forced back into crime as the only means of livelihood. Endless were the devices and schemes which Sarah Martin employed to prevent this. She would seek out respectable lodgings for the prisoners on their discharge; she would see their former employers and entreat that another chance might be given; her note-books and diaries are filled with items of her own personal expenditure in setting up her poor clients with the small stock-in-trade or the tools necessary to start some simple business on their own account.

After many years of patient and devoted work she was well known throughout the whole town and neighbourhood, and was no longer entirely dependent on her own slender earnings. Her grandmother died in 1826, and she then inherited a small income of about £12 a year. She removed into Yarmouth, and hired two rooms in a poor part of the town. Shortly after this she entirely gave up working as a dressmaker. She could not, of course, live on the little annuity she inherited from her grandmother; this was not much more than enough to pay for her rooms. But she did not fear for herself. Her personal wants were of the simplest description, and she said herself that she had no care: “God, who had called me into the vineyard, had said, ‘Whatsoever is right, I will give you.’” It would, indeed, have been to the discredit of Yarmouth if such a woman had been suffered to be in want. Many gifts were sent to her, but she scrupulously devoted everything that reached her to the prisoners, unless the donor expressly stated that it was not for her charities but for herself. About 1840, after twenty-one years’ work in the prison and workhouse of the town, the Corporation of Yarmouth urged her to accept a small salary from the borough funds. She at first refused, because it was painful to her that the prisoners should ever regard her in any other light than as their disinterested friend; she feared that if she accepted the money of the Corporation she would be looked upon as merely one of the gaol functionaries, and that they would “rank her with the turnkeys and others who got their living by the duties which they discharged.” It was urged upon her that this view was a mistaken one, and she was advised at least to accept a small salary as an experiment. She replied, “To try the experiment, which might injure the thing I live and breathe for, seems like applying a knife to your child’s throat to know if it will cut. As for my circumstances, I have not a wish ungratified, and am more than content.” The following year, however, it was evident that her health was giving way, and another attempt was made, which ended in the Corporation voting her the small sum of £12 a year, not as a salary, but as a voluntary gift to one who had been of such inestimable service to the town. She did not live long after this. Her health gradually became feebler, but she continued her daily work at the gaol till 17th April 1843. After that date she never again left her rooms, and after a few months of intense suffering, she died on the 15th October. When the nurse who was with her told her the end was near, she clasped her hands together and exclaimed, “Thank God, thank God.” They were her last words. She was buried at Caister; the tombstone which marks her grave bears an inscription dictated by herself, giving simply her name and the dates of her birth and death, with a reference to the chapter of Corinthians which forms part of the Church of England Service for the Burial of the Dead. Well, indeed, is it near that grave, and full of the thoughts inspired by that life, for us to feel that “Death is swallowed up in victory.”

The citizens of Yarmouth marked their gratitude and veneration for her by putting a stained-glass window to her memory in St. Nicholas’s Church. Her name is reverently cherished in her native town. Dr. Stanley, who was Bishop of Norwich at the time of her death, gave expression to the general feeling when he said, “I would canonise Sarah Martin if I could!”