The Norfolk girl London loved

June 8, 2005

OPIE STREET
(London Street to Castle Meadow)

She was the Norwich girl, born with a silver spoon in her mouth, who became the toast of London society before returning home to become a Quaker and devote her life to helping others.

Her name was Amelia Opie and they changed the name of this street from Devil’s Steps — a former red light area — to make sure she will never be forgotten.

Amelia Opie, a portrait by her husband.

Born in November 1769 at 3 Snailgate, later re-named Calvert Street, she was the daughter and only child of Dr Alderson, a kindly and generous Norwich doctor who saw up to 500 patients a week.

Although she had no formal schooling, her loving father did not want his daughter to grow up squeamish and shy.

She was made to handle frogs and beetles and give coins to the poor creatures who called out to her when she passed the City Asylum.

When Amelia was aged 15 her mother died and she took on the role of hostess and soon became a popular girl with the Norwich toffs.

She composed and sang her own ballads, wrote poetry and read it at gatherings and when she was 17 she wrote her first play Adelaide and played the reading role when it was performed in Norwich of 1791.

In her early 20s, Amelia spent much of her leisure time at Earlham Hall where the 11 Gurney children made her very welcome.

Her life became so interwoven with this remarkable Quaker family that whatever influenced the Gurneys was to influence her life and character too.

By now, fun-loving Amelia had set her sights on London high society where they loved this girl from Norwich.

Aged 28 she met Cornish painter John Opie, a friend of the Gurneys. She was attracted by his vitality, but at first offended by his course country ways.

Amelia’s last home on Castle Meadow.

In one letter to her friend, Mrs Taylor of Norwich, she wrote: “Mr Opie, whose head and heart are so excellent as to make me forget the courseness of his voice and manners and the ugliness of his face, has been my declared lover almost ever since I came.”

In May 1798, they were married. Two years later her dear friend Elizabeth Gurney married Joseph Fry — she went on to become the world famous prison reformer and the woman on the £5 note.

Amelia encouraged her husband in his painting; Royalty and the famous were among the sitters. She continued to write and her reputation as an author grew.

The couple became famous and travelled abroad. Paris was a favourite haunt, but Amelia always loved returning to Norwich and after her husband died at the age of 45 she moved back home.

Although having several male friends she started to devote more time to Quaker ways and looking after her father who was ill.

In the summer of 1825, the same year as her father died, Amelia was received into the Society of Friends and devoted her life to helping others.

Encouraged by Elizabeth Fry, she was a founder member of the Norwich Ladies Association for Prison Reform. She turned from wearing colourful to more sober, grey dress and her writings got more serious.

She served on the Sick Poor Committee and collected for the Bible Society — although from time to time she still fluttered her wings in Paris.

She finally returned to live in a new house on Castle Meadow in Norwich. Now aged 79 she was still writing and once wrote: “I am every day more charmed with my new house and home. I do so love to look at my noble trees and my castle turrets rising above them.”

She died at her Norwich home in 1853 at the age of 84 and is buried in the same grave as her adored father in the Friend’s cemetery.

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