Philanthropist
In the late-1780s Hannah and Martha More conducted philanthropic work in the Mendip area, following encouragement by Wilberforce, who saw the poor conditions of the locals when he visited Cheddar in 1789. She was instrumental in setting up twelve schools by 1800 where reading, the Bible and the catechism — but not writing — were taught to local children. More also donated money to Bishop Philander Chase for the founding of Kenyon College, and a portrait of her hangs there in Pierce Hall.
The More sisters met with a good deal of opposition in their works: the farmers thought that education, even to the limited extent of learning to read, would be fatal to agriculture, and the clergy, whose neglect she was making good, accused her of Methodist tendencies. In her old age, philanthropists from all parts made pilgrimages to see the bright and amiable old lady, and she retained all her faculties until within two years of her death. She spent the last five years of her life in Clifton, and died on 7 September 1833. She is buried at Church of All Saints, Wrington.
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