Jessie Saxby
Jessie Margaret Edmonton Saxby (1842-1940) was born in Halligarth on Unst, the most northerly of the Shetland Isles. Saxby was a hugely prolific writer and has been identified by Mark Ryan Smith as Shetland’s first professional writer.
In 1857, at the age of 15, Saxby first submitted her writings to Robert Chambers of Chambers’ Magazine, along with her mother’s writings. She was first published alongside her mother in The Family Herald in 1859, the same year in which she eloped to marry the English man Henry Linchmayer Saxby. She was widowed aged 31 with 5 young boys, the youngest only 1 day old. Following the loss of her husband, Saxby, more than ever before, wrote with the purpose of giving her children a bright future. She authored 40 books and countless articles, poems and pamphlets. She lived in Edinburgh for 25 years, and during this time she lived close to two Scottish writers Annie Swan and Robina F. Hardy. Together these 3 women published a collection of children’s poetry and short stories for the Scottish Universities Mission bazaar, Vita Vinctis, Life to Those That are Bound (1887).
Saxby was clearly drawn to the ideologies of Empire and the Frontier in her writings. They lent themselves well to the ‘books for boys’ genre which flourished during the later nineteenth century; Saxby was one of the only Scottish female contributors to the Boy’s Own Paper during this period. Her 1887 novel The Lads of Lunda translated the boys’ adventure narrative to the Shetland Islands. She was also deeply interested in Viking folklore and the natural sciences. In the latter she followed in the footsteps of her parents: Saxby’s father Laurence Edmonston was a doctor, ornithologist and natural history writer, and her mother Eliza wrote about Shetlandic traditions and wildlife in a collection called Sketches and Tales of the Shetland Islands (1856). The novels Daala Mist: Stories of Shetland (1876) and Sallie’s Boy (1890) are two prime examples of Saxby’s writings on Shetland folklore.
Saxby wrote many articles, poems, and short stories for the periodical press. Publications she submitted to included The Englishwoman’s Journal, Chambers’ Journal, The People’s Friend, The Shetland Times, Dundee Weekly News, Sunday at Home, Life and Work, The Scotsman, The Home Messenger, as well as Australian Herald and Australian Western Mail. Children’s periodicals that Saxby wrote for include Girl’s Own Paper, Chatterbox, Boy’s Own Paper, and The Young Woman.
Saxby travelled widely and was particularly drawn to the Canadian north west. Amongst her Canadian writings published in the periodical press are Heathens from Home (1892), a travelogue of a trip to Vancouver Island, Dominion Day (1891) about the Canadian national holiday, the Last of the Sea King (1891), a tale of the late Captain Lindall of the RMS Vancouver, and Pi-a-Pot’s Reserve (1891), about a native Canadian chief.
Saxby was good friends with the travel writer Isabella Bird, and Dr. Joseph Bell, who was the inspiration for Arthur Conan Doyle’s character Sherlock Holmes. Her views on women’s suffrage were complex and often contradictory; she was a member of the Edinburgh Women’s Liberal Association but believed that only men’s voices should be heard in the political arena. She was attracted to liberal politics generally, following Mr Gladstone and supporting Home Rule in Ireland.
Saxby lived until the age of 98. Her childhood home in Unst has been acquired by the National Trust for Scotland and The Shetland Amenity Trust holds archival collections related to Saxby.
Contributed by Lois Burke
bibliography
Sarah Dunnigan, Scottish Early Literature for Children Initiative blog, https://www.blogs.hss.ed.ac.uk/selcie/2017/03/10/jessie-saxby-1842-1940-shetlands-first-childrens-writer/, March 10 2017.
Sarah Dunnigan, ‘A great, unlimited world’?: Imaginative Locations in the Fairy Tales of Jessie Saxby and Violet Jacob’, The Land of Story Books: Scottish Children’s Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century. Glasgow: Scottish Literature International, 2019.
Mark Ryan Smith, The Literature of Shetland (Shetland Times Ltd, 2014).
Philip Snow, Tales From Wullver's Hool: The extraordinary long life and prodigious works of Jessie Saxby (Shetland Times, 2018).