When he first met pioneering missionary William Carey's four boys in 1800, Marshman was appalled by the neglect with which Carey treated them. Aged 4, 7, 12 and 15, they were unmannered, undisciplined, and even uneducated. Marshman, his wife Hannah, and their friend the printer William Ward, took the boys in tow. Together they shaped the boys as Carey pampered his botanical specimens, performed his many missionary tasks and journeyed into Calcutta to teach at Fort William College. They offered the boys structure, instruction and companionship. To their credit - and little to Carey's - all four boys went on to useful careers.