This disarmingly simple biography throws interesting light upon early nineteenth-century dissent and its engagement in international mission. Though simply told the study is the product of painstaking research both in this country and in Russia, beginning with the tensions in Wesleyan Methodism following the death of John Wesley, for Sarah Biller (1788–1852) was the sole surviving daughter of Alexander Kilham, fearless tract writer, editor and first secretary of the Methodist New Connexion, which in 1797 split from the parent Wesleyan body over such issues as lay representation, the celebration of communion by Methodist itinerant preachers, and a desire to identify with dissent rather than the established Church. In the same year Kilham married Hannah Spurr, a former Quaker, who thus became Sarah's stepmother, and who as much as her husband, had a formative influence on the young Sarah, especially when she reverted to the Society of Friends and undertook pioneering missionary service in West Africa. This was well described by Sarah, Hannah's first biographer, all the necessary documentation having to be shipped to St Petersburg and then back to England. Experience of teaching in her mother's school in Sheffield, together with other philanthropic endeavours, prepared Sarah, who in 1808 also joined the Friends, for her subsequent work in Russia. The work of mother and daughter, ‘strong determined women’, in Africa and Russia, represents a remarkable contribution to women's history. Here too is the remarkable story of the interaction between British Evangelicals and the Russian court in the early nineteenth century following Tsar Alexander's visit to London in the summer of 1814 when he attended Quaker worship. Whilst imperial patronage proved sporadic, other members of the court were more constant in their patronage of Sarah's schools, developed on the Lancasterian model, and of her other philanthropic endeavours. Such connections are interesting as illustrating for an earlier period similar associations secured by Lord Radstock at the end of the century. The strength of the expatiate Evangelical community in St Petersburg, with its numerous family and business linkages, and its concern for such societies as the BFBS and BFSS, and related indigenous Russian bodies, is here well illustrated, much of it centring on the Congregational Church to which Richard Knill ministered. Also revealed in this study is the openness of the Orthodox Church to collaboration with Protestants in philanthropic activities, so that from 1846 Sarah was director of the wide-ranging social programme of the Community of the Sisters of Charity. For her part she demonstrated deep respect for Orthodox spirituality as seen in her relationship with the ‘starets’, elder, or spiritual counsellor, Makary, with whom she discussed mutual concerns including women's service in the Church and the importance of bible translation. To conclude their meeting Makary suggested they should read the Scriptures – in John xvi and xvii – and then engage in silent prayer together, with a special focus on the need to make the whole Bible available in Russian.