Elizabeth Hooton was an English dissenter and one of the earliest preachers in the Religious Society of Friends - the Quakers. She was the first woman to become a Quaker minister. Elizabeth was born in Ollerton, Nottingham, her maiden name was Elizabeth Carrier.
She married Oliver Hooten in 1628 and moved to Skegby. By 1646, when George Fox came to Skegby, she had become part of the baptist community. Meeting George was to change her whole life.
Initially against the wishes of her husband, she began to organize meetings at their house where the remnants of her Baptist group could hear George’s ministry. This group became known as the Children of Light.
She was one of the first to be convinced by the teachings of George Fox. Some sources suggest that Fox actually clarified some of his beliefs by being mentored by Elizabeth. She was one of the original Valiant Sixty.
For her beliefs she was beaten, imprisoned, assaulted, whipped and abandoned. In 1651 she was imprisoned for reproving - talking disrespectfully about - a priest. 1652 she ended in York Castle prison for preaching to a congregation at the end of a service. Assaulted in Selston by a church minister who knew she was a Quaker.
In the USA she travelled to Boston and Massachusetts. In both places she was abandoned.
She petitioned King Charles 11. He gave her a letter authorizing her to settle anywhere in the American colonies and to set up a safe house for Quakers. In Boston she was expelled; in Cambridge she was whipped.
Back in England she spent 5 months in jail for disturbing a congregation.
Her final voyage was to the West Indies and the USA with George Fox in 1670. In 1672, a week after arriving in Jamaica she died peacefully.
*Elizabeth Hooton, a woman of great age, who had travelled much in Truth’s service, and suffered much for it, departed this life. She was well the day before she died, and departed in peace, like a lamb, bearing testimony to Truth at her departure George Fox
Sources used
wikipedia
Quakers of the World
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