Charlotte Tucker

Charlotte Maria Tucker was born on May 8, 1821, in Barnet, Hertfordshire, England. Her father, Henry Carre Tucker, was a senior official of the East India Company, and the family lived in comfort and moved in educated circles. Charlotte was a lively and imaginative child with a gift for storytelling. She grew up in a home that valued reading and was educated at home by tutors. She also learned from her father's stories of India, which stirred her interest in that land.

As a young woman she lived the life of a gentlewoman, and she began to write. She published under the pen name A.L.O.E., which stood for A Lady of England. Over many years she produced more than a hundred books, mostly for children and young people. They were stories with a Christian purpose, written with a lively style and often in the form of allegories. Among the best known were The Giant-Killer, The Roby Family and The Shepherd of Bethlehem. They were widely read in Britain and in the mission fields, and they were translated into several languages. She gave her earnings to the support of missions.

She had a quiet and sincere faith. She often said that she wished to give her whole life to the Lord, but she did not see a way. She was devoted to her family and cared for her elderly parents. In the 1870s, after their deaths, she felt free to follow a long-held desire. In 1875, at the age of fifty-four, she sailed for India as a missionary. She went as an independent worker, paying her own way, and she joined the Church of England Zenana Mission, which reached women in their homes.

She settled in Batala, in the Punjab, in northern India. She lived in a simple house and dressed as an Indian woman. She gave up the comforts of her upbringing and adopted a plain life. She ate local food, slept on a simple bed and lived among the poor. She taught in schools, visited the sick and spoke to people of Christ. She learned the language of the Punjab. She continued to write and to send her stories to be published, and her earnings paid for her work.

She was not a strong woman. She suffered from illness and was often weak in the heat. Her family and friends feared for her life. There were also those who thought it foolish for a woman of her age and background to go to such a place. She had to deal with loneliness and a sense that she could not do enough. She was open about her struggles and wrote about them to friends.

She stayed in India for eighteen years. She was a familiar figure in the town, and the people called her by affectionate names. She died on December 2, 1893, at Amritsar, at the age of seventy-two. She was buried in the land that she had come to love.

Her life shows that it is never too late to begin. A woman who had written books for decades chose in her fifties to give herself to a hard calling in a distant land, and she did it with humility and joy.