Jemima, Mary, and Christina: Three Women and the Oxford Movement

On March 10 and 11, I watched/listened to the National Institute of Newman Studies (NINS) Spring Symposium, which featured four presentations and a round table on Friday evening and Saturday morning/afternoon. One of the participants on the round table Saturday afternoon was Elizabeth Huddleston, one of the Associate Editors of the Newman Review. She is also the Head of Research and Publications at NINS and a Teaching Fellow in the Department of Catholic Studies at Duquesne University. 

Receiving a recent email from NINS, I noted she'd written an article about Newman and three women, "Rethinking Newman's Influence: The Female Sources". The article immediately made me think of Edward Short's Newman and His Family (for the chapter on Newman and his mother Jemima, whom Huddleston also considers in this article), and Joyce Sugg's Ever Yours Affly: John Henry Newman and His Female Circle.

Since I visited Littlemore in 2010, and saw the plaque dedicated to his mother and her help in building the Anglican church there and building up the community with charitable and education programs, I was most interested in what Huddleston said about her. An excerpt:

Seen in Newman’s correspondence with his mother about Littlemore is the development of his pastoral opinion of how Littlemore ought to be run, as well as the growth of his enthusiasm for his responsibilities to the people of Littlemore, all of which were the encouragement of his mother and her love for the people at Littlemore. At the beginning of his tenure at St. Mary the Virgin—which originally included the people of Littlemore, who were located a couple of miles from Oxford City Centre—Newman would spend the vast majority of his time at Oriel and St. Mary the Virgin, while the people of Littlemore, who were without a chapel at the time, were often an afterthought. At the consistent encouragement of his mother, Newman would come to realize that the people of Littlemore had their own distinctive needs, which led to Newman’s founding of the chapel of Saint Mary and Saint Nicholas, as well as a school. Many of the letters exchanged between Newman and his mother at this time explained these particular needs, such as a governess to teach the children and someone to make sure the children had proper clothing and combed hair for Easter Sunday. Newman became deeply involved in the life of Littlemore and would eventually prefer it over the hustle and bustle of academic life in Oxford. Writing to his mother and sister, both named Jemima, Newman would eventually say how he wished he could spend all his time in Littlemore because he had become quite fond of the people, particularly the children.4

Much of what Newman did for the people of Littlemore was at the encouragement of his mother. In a letter dated 26 June 1836 Newman reminisced on his relationship with his mother shortly after her death, about which he said, “I can never repent it for the good she has done to Littlemore.”5 Newman dedicated the chapel he built at Littlemore to his mother, and we can observe the monument at St. Mary and St. Nicholas church still today.

The pictures above are from our visit to Littlemore as part of a tour during an Oxford Experience class on The Oxford Movement in 2009.

Huddleston also considers briefly the religious influences of mother and son in her article. Please read the rest of the article, including sketches of Miss Mary Holmes, musicologist, governess, correspondent with Newman, and convert to Catholicism, and the poet Christina Rossetti.