This remarkable woman was born in Aberdeen in 1848, but, when she was ten, her parents moved to Dundee, looking for work as weavers.
Her father was an alcoholic and died young, but her mother was a Christian in the United Presbyterian Church. This church had started a pioneer mission work in Calabar, now part of Eastern Nigeria, and the stories from Calabar were studied in the Slessor house.
It must have been a miserable upbringing. The seven children and Mrs. Slessor lived in a one-roomed house which had no water, no light and no inside toilet.
