Madeleine Septimia Shaw Lefevre (6 May 1835 – 19 September 1914) was the Principal of Somerville Hall from 1879 to 1889. The hall became Somerville College, Oxford in 1894.
Contents
Early life
Shaw Lefevre was born in 1835, the seventh child of the barrister and politician John Shaw Lefevre, and his wife, Rachael Emily Wright. As a member of the prominent Shaw Lefevre family of civil servants and politicians, Madeline benefited from a privileged upbringing, although surprisingly little is known about her early life.
In 1866, she travelled to Fredericton, New Brunswick, to visit her sister Rachael, whose husband Arthur Hamilton-Gordon was Lieutenant-Governor, and from there Shaw Lefevre travelled with the Hamilton-Gordons to Trinidad, where she stayed for some months.
Shaw Lefevre first became involved in public life during the 1870s, probably through the influence of Julia Reynolds-Moreton, Countess of Ducie, the mother-in-law of Shaw Lefevre's brother, George. The Countess was a founding member of the Workhouse Visiting Society, and through this connection Shaw Lefevre became a member of the central committee of the Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants.