Elizabeth Hooton in Skegby, Nottinghamshire

 

The snowy photo above is of the village of Skegby near Sutton in Ashfield, Nottinghamshire from Emily Manners's Elizabeth Hooton: First Quaker Woman Preacher (1600–1672) (London: Headley Brothers, 1914). Hooton (née Carrier) married Oliver Hooten in Ollerton and moved to Skegby. She was a Baptist in 1647 when she met the young George Fox, but was to become a prominent, and radical, figure in the Quaker movement.

Hooten's preaching and accusations of corruption in the church and the magistrates led to her being imprisoned several times, which in turn led to her protesting about prison conditions.

In her manuscripts Hooton writes about her various overseas journeys preaching, and of the violent persecution she and others Friends received in the neighbourhood of Boston, Massachusetts.

In 1671 she made her final journey when she went with George Fox and others to Barbados and Jamaica, where she died of unknown causes the following year.

Along with mentioning many manuscripts, Manners lists the following printed works by Hooton:

False Prophets and False Teachers Described [1652].
To the King and Both Houses of Parliament [1670].
A Short Relation Concerning William Simpson (1671).

There are about ten pages of Hooton's writings in this relatively recent publication: Autobiographical Writings by Early Quaker Women, by David Booy (Aldershot : Ashgate, c. 2004).

Above: The Quaker House in Skegby, taken by me in about 1996.

Below is a link to the complete text of Emily Manners's biography of the remarkable Elizabeth Hooton:

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Elizabeth Hooton, by Emily Manners