Caroline Fry

Caroline Fry (December 31, 1787 – September 17, 1846), a British Christian writer, later Mrs Caroline Wilson, was born and died at Tunbridge Wells in Kent. She was one of ten children born to John and Jane Fry. She married William Wilson at Desford, Leicestershire on 26 May, 1831.

Fry's family was affiliated with the "High Church" in the Church of England. Her brother John Fry (1775 – 1849) attended Oxford University and later became rector of Desford. He also wrote a number of Christian books. His evangelical faith had an impact on Caroline and others of her family who abandoned the high-and-dry Anglicanism of their upbringing for a more fervent evangelical piety. After Fry's conversion experience in 1822 found in her Autobiography and published in Christ Our Example, she produced an impressive list of publications over the remaining years of her life. Fry was an Anglican theologian, writer, poet and Christian educator who wrote from a Reformed perspective on a variety of theological issues.

Sir Thomas Lawrence painted a famous portrait of her in 1827. Tate Gallery "Miss Caroline Fry" page

Some of her published writings

• The Assistant of Education: religious and literary. Intended for the use of young persons from ten to sixteen years of age (periodical)
• An Autobiography; letters and remains of the author of the "Listener," etc
• Christ our Example (still available secondhand and possibly new)
• Christ our Law
• Daily readings : passages of scripture selected for social reading, with applications
• Death, and other poems
• Gatherings; a collection of short pieces
• The Gospel of the Old Testament : an explanation of the types and figures by which Christ was exhibited under the legal dispensation / rewritten from the original work of Samuel Mather
• The Great Commandment
• The Listener (still readily available secondhand)
• The Listener in Oxford
• Narrative of Poll Peg, of Leicestershire
• Peggy Lum, or, A hint to the purchasers of smuggled goods

(the two previous items are from The Assistant of Education)

• A Poetical Catechism; or, sacred poetry for the use of young persons
• Prayers
• Scripture principles of education
• The Scripture Reader's Guide to the devotional use of the Holy Scriptures
• Seek to be like the Saviour
• Serious poetry (available online as an e-text at University of California, Davis)
• Sunday Afternoons at Home
• The Table of the Lord
• A word to women, The love of the world, and other gatherings

(source COPAC)

Sources

• Making of America Books at University of Michigan - search for "Caroline Fry" and follow links to:

1. A critical dictionary of English literature, and British and American authors (page 641)
2. The divine life: a book of facts and histories (pages 90-99 are a description of her early life and spiritual progress)

• Caroline Fry genealogy page at "Murphys in Oz"