When Elizabeth Fry visited Newgate Prison in 1813 it changed her life. And as a result she changed the lives of countless others.

What she saw at Newgate was harrowing. Over 300 women were crammed together, many with children. Those convicted of murder were jammed in with people who’d stolen a loaf from the market, alongside women who hadn’t yet gone to trial. Conditions were filthy, freezing and violent. So Elizabeth, Quaker minister and mother of 11, set to work.

Elizabeth Gurney was born in 1780 in Gurney Court, Magdalen Street, Norwich, where a plaque commemorates her, and also at the Friends’ Meeting House in Goat Lane. Also, the UEA’s School of Social Work and Psychology is housed in the Elizabeth Fry building. Daughter of influential Quakers, aged 20 ‘Betsy’ married Joseph Fry, cousin of the Fry confectionery family, also Quakers. She was hugely inspired by the travelling Quaker speaker William Savery, and committed her life to good works. After her Newgate experience she campaigned tirelessly for prison reform including segregation of the sexes, female matrons for female prisoners, education and employment. Called the ‘Angel of Prisons’, she cared about rehabilitation over punishment.

Her drive for change played a huge part in transforming prison ships, the abolition of slavery, housing for the poor, soup kitchens and nursing. Elizabeth is one of only three women celebrated on a Bank of England note (£5), pictured reading to women prisoners. Long after her death in 1845, Elizabeth Fry still inspires social transformation today.