Born: 1817, United Kingdom
Died: 1847
Country most active: United Kingdom
Also known as: Anne Jane Gallagher
This biography is republished from The Dictionary of Irish Biography and was written by Angela Byrne. Shared by permission in line with Creative Commons ‘Attribution’ (CC BY) licencing.
Thornton, Anne Jane (also Ann Jane; married name Gallagher) (1817–47), seafarer and subject of popular legend, was born in Gloucestershire, England, to a prosperous merchant. Following the death of her mother in 1823 the family moved to Ballyshannon, Co. Donegal, where her father owned stores; they lived ‘in good circumstances’ (Saint James’s Chronicle, 12 Feb. 1835). Ballyshannon was at the time a small but thriving port and market town with trade and migration links to North America, Britain and northern Europe. At the age of thirteen, Thornton met seafarer Captain Alexander Burke; it was euphemistically reported that ‘before she was fifteen they became strongly attached to each other’ (ibid.). Their affair ending on his return to New Brunswick in 1832, Thornton decided to follow him there. Accompanied by a maidservant and servant boy, she left for the Americas disguised as a cabin boy; the maidservant returned to Ballyshannon to inform Thornton’s family of her whereabouts. Thornton later said of her decision to pose as a cabin boy, ‘I could not think of any other way, and I did the duties as well as I could’ (ibid.).
Remaining in disguise, Thornton made the forty-mile trek on foot from the dock at Eastport, Maine, through the forest to Burke’s family home at St Andrew’s, New Brunswick (elsewhere, Burke’s home has been incorrectly given as New York). Acting the part of a former employee seeking to be re-employed, she was informed of his death. To support herself, she continued in the guise of a sailor and obtained a position as cook and steward aboard the Adelaide, a ship plying the Mediterranean route, for the next two years. Short but stout, and of a swarthy complexion, she easily passed for a male sailor. With the aim, apparently, of returning to live with her father, she left the Adelaide at Lisbon for the Sarah, a Belfast-registered, London-bound vessel. Its captain, McIntyre, hired her as a cook and steward and suspected nothing of her true identity, later stating that she was ‘a capital seaman’ (ibid., 12 Feb. 1835). Life aboard ship was tough, however: the work was demanding, and Thornton was verbally and physically assaulted for appearing weaker than her crewmates.
Shortly before the Sarah arrived in London, Thornton’s secret was discovered: another sailor caught a glimpse of her breasts while she was washing in her berth. (There was speculation that the crew’s suspicions had already been aroused on account of her refusal to drink grog.) The sailor attempted to coerce her into sex by threatening to reveal her secret, but she went to the captain herself. Thornton claimed that McIntyre – who later attempted to acquit himself – refused to protect her from the men and forced her to work amongst them, despite their ill-treatment of her.
When the Sarah docked at Billingsgate, London, in February 1835, word of Thornton’s pretence quickly spread; she was reportedly convinced to come ashore by some gentlemen who were in the vicinity and became concerned for her safety, even though McIntyre owed her five months’ pay. She was placed in accommodation and her story attracted a great deal of attention from the press. The lord mayor of London directed the inspector of police, McLean, to investigate her claims and background, and ascertain what assistance might be offered to her. (Later, when another similar case emerged, McLean was again called upon because of his previous experience in dealing with Thornton.) After interviewing Thornton, McLean suggested presenting her at the Mansion House, where she was accompanied by McIntyre. A detailed report of the interview was given to the press, including purported dialogue between Thornton and McIntyre in which the latter sought to clear himself of any suggestion of abuse or mistreatment. He pressed Thornton to confirm that he had treated her with kindness, before and after her secret was discovered; the fact that he was withholding wages may have influenced her positive declaration that he had ‘acted towards her with humanity, and had desired her to complain to him if any of the crew ever treated her harshly’ (Morning Advertiser, 11 Feb. 1835). (He later clarified that he withheld the wages on the grounds that he had hired a man, not a woman.) The lord mayor provided Thornton with financial support and accommodation in London until her family could be contacted.
Thornton’s story created a sensation. Such crowds gathered outside her lodgings at Cooper’s Arms, Lower Thames Street, that she had to be secretly removed to another, more private, location. Theatre owners offered exhibition fees of a guinea per night (which Thornton refused). Letters and articles appeared in the regional press with tales of previous female sailors, and historic examples of women who assumed male roles. With so much public attention fixed on the minutiae of her life, efforts were made to preserve Thornton’s good name. The landlady of the Cooper’s Arms was said to have developed great respect for Thornton, McIntyre testified as to her propriety and press reports emphasised her strength of character and the moral lessons she had learned from her ordeal, quoting her: ‘I am anxious to get home. I hope and believe that my father will forgive me for the sorrow I have caused him. I have my own sorrows too’ (Saint James’s Chronicle, 12 Feb. 1835).
Meanwhile, efforts to locate Thornton’s family continued. When the lord mayor of London’s initial attempts were unsuccessful, he requested Sir Francis Freeling, secretary general of the Post Office, to make local enquiries. When it was discovered that Thornton’s father had emigrated to Canada shortly after her disappearance, but that a sister of hers still lived in Ballyshannon, Thornton was given the choice to remain in London or to be reunited with her sister in Co. Donegal; she chose the latter, with the lord mayor funding her journey. The local and regional press in Co. Donegal and the north-west reported on her arrival in Ballyshannon, from Liverpool via Derry, on 10 April 1835. A crowd gathered outside her sister’s house in Back Lane (Tirconnaill Street). The Ballyshannon Herald claimed to have interviewed her, reporting that she was ‘quite tired of the sea, she says she would not again join it for £500 a year, as it is the most wretched life imaginable’ (10 Apr. 1835). A letter of dubious authenticity, purportedly from Thornton to the lord mayor of London, was published in April 1835, communicating Thornton’s safe arrival in Donegal and her gratitude for his assistance.
Thornton settled in Donegal town but soon struggled financially; she was said to have petitioned the king and been granted an annual pension of £10. She was also reputedly granted, by the Liberal politician Alexander Murray of Broughton, the farm that her father had previously occupied. (The Murrays held extensive properties around Donegal, Ardara and Killybegs; the farm granted to Thornton was likely in the vicinity of Lough Eske.) She married a Ballyshannon man by the name of Gallagher in February 1836, with whom she had a son, William (b. Dec. 1836); nothing further is known of them or of the reportedly large family she subsequently had.
Thornton died in Donegal in May 1847 from the fever that was rampant during the Great Famine; she was said to have contracted the disease while nursing her husband during his own illness. She was buried among the ruins of Donegal’s Franciscan abbey on 3 May 1847.
Although she was occasionally branded an eccentric by the press, Thornton was reported to have been industrious by nature and grateful for the assistance she had received. Her story found a wide audience in the age of the Romantic novel and the travelogue, and she published a short autobiography soon after her exploits came to light (Interesting life and wonderful adventures of that extraordinary woman Anne Jane Thornton … (1835)). Thornton also inspired the folk ballad ‘The female sailor’, which was published as a broadside, and a woodcut of her likeness sold in the thousands.