Captain Forbes renamed her Sara Forbes Bonetta, after his ship HMS "Bonetta". In 1850, she met the queen, who was impressed by the young princess's exceptional intelligence, and had the girl, whom she called Sally, raised as her goddaughter in the British middle class. In 1851, Sara developed a chronic cough, which was attributed to the climate of Great Britain. Her guardians sent her to school in Africa in May of that year, when she was aged eight. She attended the Annie Walsh Memorial School (AWMS) in Freetown, Sierra Leone. The school was founded by the Church Missionary Society (CMS) in January 1849 as an institution for young women and girls who were relatives of the boys in the Sierra Leone Grammar School founded in 1845 (at first named CMS Grammar School). In the school register, her name appears only as Sally Bonetta, pupil number 24, June 1851, who got married to Captain Davies in England in 1862 and was the ward of Queen Victoria. She returned to England in 1855, when she was 12. She was entrusted to the care of Rev Frederick Scheon and his wife, who lived at Palm Cottage, Canterbury Street Gillingham. The house survives. In January 1862, she was invited to and attended the wedding of Queen Victoria's daughter Princess Alice.