Helen KENNEDY SKIPTON (née TOW) [1982-1982]

Wife of George Kennedy-Skipton, mother of Enid and Laetitia.

barryd writes:

Helen Tow

Helen Tow was the daughter of Ole Tow and Anna M. Norland. She was born in Norway, Benton County, Iowa, United States, 15 October 1892. Helen was barely 7 years old when her father died. He was born in Norway, Europe and died in Norway in Iowa.

In 1913 and 1917 Helen Tow is included in the Annual Report of the "Foreign Missions". The 1913 item announcing she had just arrived in Canton as a new missionary.

In 1913 when she was 21 Helen Tow was in Canton, China and Hong Kong part of a team under the direction of their Quaker leader, William Warder Cadbury MD, working for the “American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions”.  William Warder Cadbury was an insatiable diarist and letter writer, and his writings contained many day-to-day items of interest. He comments on Helen Tow’s help as an organizer and bridesmaid at his own wedding in China in 1917. He acknowledges Helen Tow’s report to him when she worked at the Congregational School for Girls in Canton during the 1918 Influenza Epidemic, and finally in 1924 he states that “Helen Tow is getting married to an English man”.

On 23 August 1924 Helen Tow married George Stacey Kennedy-Skipton [Burke’s Directory]. The marriage was probably in Hong Kong but possibly in Canton.

Helen Tow did die in 1982, Camden, London. The English/Welsh death index for that year includes her birth date – 15 October 1892! 

She was in Hong Kong during the fighting in 1941, and subsequent Japanese occupation. Unusually, she appears to have lived in her own house throughout the occupation, not in Stanley Camp like most Europeans.

Philip Cracknell wrote:

In a letter I have seen (copy of) written by Emily Hahn around the time of the 2nd repatriation in 1943 Helen and her two daughters were still living in the Wanchai Gap area (home of GK-S) not in Taipo. According to her letter she described Helen as a friend one of the few European women out of Camp living in occupied Hong Kong on account of her husband's Irish nationality. Emily cites that they were well and had access to funds.