Dundee Years

MARY M. SLESSOR The “Uncrowned Queen” of Old Calabar by James Johnston:

“Scotia has no greater living heroine than Miss Mary Mitchell Slessor, whose record of achievement forms an almost unbelieveable story in the annals of the Old Calabar missions. She has shown to the world what a “woman of action” can do in the warfare against suffering, cruelty, degradation, and heathenism in one of the darkest lands on the face of the earth.”

Mary Slessor, a Dundee mill girl, was inspired to travel to Calabar in Western Africa to become a missionary in 1876. Her determination and spirit and the strong connection she made with the local tribes while living with them, meant that she became much more than a missionary and is remembered and celebrated there still, 100 years since her death.