Weston started as a Sunday School teacher and carried out philanthropic work - common for a woman of her class. She wrote to soldiers and opened a coffee shop for soldiers before being asked to write to a sailor. With illiteracy high, she was also asked to write to the wives of servicemen on their behalf. This began her long association with the Navy.
With her friend, Sophia Wintz, Weston raised funds and opened the first Sailors Rest, taking particular pleasure in buying up pubs to use them for temperance means. The letters that she wrote increased until she was producing many thousands of them as monthly newsletters.
The Sailors Rest provided accomodation, restaurants and recreational facilities and spread across the world - as far afield as Australia.
Weston and Wintz also worked with the wives and campaigned for wages to be paid to the wives and for widows pensions. (When a sailor died his pay stopped immediately and the families could be left in terrible poverty)
When Weston died she was buried with full naval honours.
I can recommend Weston's book "My Life Among the Blue-Jackets".
For more on Agnes Weston, click here