Hannah Marshman (13 May 1767 – 5 March 1847) was an English missionary who founded a school at Serampore, India. She was the daughter of John Shepherd, a farmer, and his wife Rachel, and the granddaughter of John Clark, pastor of the Baptist church at Crockerton, Wiltshire. Her mother died when she was eight. In 1791 Hannah Shepherd married Joshua Marshman. In 1794, the couple moved from Westbury Leigh in Wiltshire to Bristol, where they joined the Broadmead Baptist Church. The couple were to eventually have 12 children; of these only five were alive when Hannah Marshman died. Hannah Marshman is considered to be the first woman missionary in India. Missionary work On 29 May 1799, Hannah, Joshua and their two children set out from Portsmouth for India, aboard the ship Criterion. Although there was a threat of a French naval attack, the family landed safely at the Danish settlement of Serampore (a few miles north of Calcutta) on 13 October 1799. They had chosen to land here because the East India Company was at that time hostile to missionaries. They settled in the Danish colony and were joined there by William Carey on 10 January 1800. On 1 May 1800, Joshua and Hannah Marshman opened two boarding schools at Serampore. The schools became the most popular in the Presidency and their son John Clark Marshman received his education from his parents. He was part of the growing mission family, eating at the communal table and joining with other children in mission life. As with all other mission family members, he was encouraged to become a fluent Bengali speaker. Meanwhile, the Missionary Society had begun sending more missionaries to India. The first to arrive was John Fountain, who arrived in Mudnabatty and began a teaching school. He was followed by William Ward, a printer; David Brunsdon, one of Marshman's students; and William Grant, who died three weeks after his arrival. The spirit of the early community's unity was somewhat broken when new missionaries arrived who were not willing to live in the communal fashion that had developed. One missionary demanded "...a separate house, stable and servants." There were also other differences, as the new missionaries found their seniors – particularly Joshua Marshman – to be somewhat dictatorial, assigning them duties which were not to their liking. In 1800, when she first met them, Marshman was appalled by the neglect in