Donaldina Cameron

Donaldina Cameron (1869–1968) was a pioneering social reformer and Presbyterian missionary who rescued abused women and girls in San Francisco’s Chinatown from the late 19th to mid-20th century. Born in New Zealand to Scottish parents, Cameron immigrated to California as a child.
She came to San Francisco in 1895 to teach at the Presbyterian Occidental Mission Home for Girls on Sacramento Street, a mission devoted to rescuing Chinese girls and women from sex slavery and indentured servitude and converting them to Christianity, and soon became the superintendent and rescue leader. Her work combined rescue with education, conversion, and finding jobs or marriages. It also involved legal aid. The Occidental Mission helped fight "habeas corpus" and custody suits brought by the girls' enslavers and deportation proceedings which frightened many of the victims almost as much.
Sometimes called the "White Devil" (Fahn Quai) by slave owners, or "Angry Angel of Chinatown" by journalists, Cameron was known to the girls as "Lo Mo" - Cantonese for Mother. Her daring raids continued the work of her mentor, Margaret Culbertson, and eventually saved an estimated 2,000 to 3,000 Chinese immigrants including Tye Leung Schulze and Tien Fuh Wu.
She would operate on the basis of anonymous reports from the neighbors. Gathering a group of a few police officers and one or two translators she'd set out at night for one of Chinatown's alleys. While police officers stood guard at alley exits the missionaries would chop down the door ^{1Not as easy as it sounds, many of the establishments they visited had steel or at least double-board doors to prevent just such an event.} and rush in while the slavers attempted to escape with their victims through hidden passageways and across rooftops. She was not deterred by threats, lawsuits, or even dynamite placed at her door. Only old age caused Cameron to move to Palo Alto and switch from active rescues to fundraising.
The organization she led through such challenges as the 1906 earthquake and the deadly Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918 is helping San Franciscans still, and is known as Cameron House: https://cameronhouse.org/.
^{1Not as easy as it sounds, many of the establishments they visited had steel or at least double-board doors to prevent just such an event.} Not as easy as it sounds, many of the establishments they visited had steel or at least double-board doors to prevent just such an event.