Mary Frances Heaton

Mary Frances Heaton (1801-1878) was an Englishwoman who was committed to an insane asylum in 1837 for insulting an Anglican vicar and was never released.

Life

She was born into an affluent family in Doncaster then in the West Riding of Yorkshire. Her father was made bankrupt when she was 11. She became a music teacher, living and working in London; but returned to Doncaster to care for her dying father. After his death, she resumed teaching, in Doncaster. One of her pupils was the daughter of Rev. John Sharpe, vicar of St George's Minster, Doncaster. He failed to pay for the twice-weekly lessons she had given in 1834 and 1835; and she interrupted one of his sermons, calling him "a whited sepulchre, a thief, a villain, a liar and a hypocrite". In 2023, Heaton became the subject of a play, The Unravelling Fantasia of Miss H. by Red Gray and Sarah Nicolls, of the company Stitched-Up-Theatre. According to Lucy Brownson, the play "blends contemporary opera, physical theatre and Mary’s stitched testimonies to tell her remarkable and tragic story in her own words".