Caroline Ashurst Stansfeld

In London, on 28 January 1816, Caroline Ashurst was born to Elizabeth Brown and William Ashurst. Her siblings were William Henry Ashurst, Eliza Ann Ashurst (Bardonneau), Emilie Ashurst (Venturi) and Matilda Ashurst (Biggs). She grew up in the Ashurst home in Muswell Hill. ==Activism==

Like her sisters and her husband, Caroline Stansfeld was active in the feminist movement from its beginnings in the 1840s. She sat on the Whittington Club's executive council for equal adult education, worked to reform prostitution laws through the Associate Institution, worked to repeal the Contagious Diseases Act, and worked closely with radical Clementia Taylor. She was actively involved in the London Society for Women's Suffrage between 1867 and 1883. She supported abolitionism and the side of the Union in the US Civil War. She and her husband were members and she was a fundraiser of the Society of the Friends of Italy, supporting the unification of Italy. At the Isle of Wight and in London she and her husband ran a salon frequented by Giuseppe Mazzini, Richard Cobden, Eugene Oswald, Malvida Mesenbug, Mathilde Blind, Moncure Conway, and "so many bright personalities." ==Later years==

Stanfeld's physical and mental health declined starting in 1881. She died on 29 March 1885 of a cerebral haemorrhage in her home, Stoke Lodge, Hyde Park Gate, London. She is buried at St. Denys Church in Rotherfield. ==References==