Tribute to woman who found freedom in North

A STRIKING statue has been unveiled to honour a remarkable woman who fled slavery in the United States and found freedom in the North East.

- DANIEL HOLLAND Local Democracy Reporter

A newly-unveiled statue in North Shields honouring escaped enslaved woman Mary Ann Macham, inset

The memorial to Mary Ann Macham has been installed in North Shields, celebrating her “extraordinary courage” and the compassion of those who welcomed her on Tyneside.

Dozens of people braved a blizzard yesterday lunchtime to see the bronze figure unveiled, looking over the Fish Quay from the Riverside Embankment Walkway, as part of North Shields’ 800th anniversary celebrations.

A mixed-race woman who was the daughter of a farm owner's son and a black enslaved woman, Mary Ann was born in the US state of Virginia in 1802.

She was sold at the age of 12 and subjected to regular whippings and other brutal punishments, before bravely fleeing the plantation and stowing away on a ship to make the 60-day journey across the Atlantic.

Smuggled aboard a boat which travelled first to the Netherlands before England, she arrived in the Tyneside fishing town by road on Christmas Day 1831.