Helen Roseveare (21 September 1925 – 7 December 2016) was an English Christian missionary, doctor, and author. She worked with Worldwide Evangelization Crusade in the Congo from 1953 to 1973, including part of the period of political instability in the early 1960s. She practiced medicine and also trained others in medical work.
Helen Roseveare was born in Haileybury College in Hertfordshire, England in 1925. Her father was Martin Roseveare, the designer of ration books for the United Kingdom used during the Second World War. Her brother, Bob Roseveare, was a wartime codebreaker. She became a Christian as a medical student at Newnham College, Cambridge in 1945. She was involved with the Cambridge Inter-Collegiate Christian Union, attending prayer meetings, Bible study classes, and evangelical events.
After completing her studies, Roseveare applied to WEC to be a medical missionary. In 1953, she went to the Congo, where she was assigned to the northeast provinces. She built a combination hospital/ training center in Ibambi in the early 1950s, then relocated to Nebobongo, living in an old leprosy camp, where she built another hospital. After conflict with other staff at the hospital, she returned to England in 1958.
She returned to Congo in 1960. In 1964 she was taken prisoner by rebel forces and she remained a prisoner for five months, enduring beatings and r apes. She left the Congo and headed back to England after her release but returned to the Congo in 1966 to assist in the rebuilding of the nation. She helped establish a new medical school and hospital, as the other hospitals that she built had been destroyed, and served there until she left in 1973.
After her return from Africa, she had a worldwide ministry speaking and writing. She was a plenary speaker at the Urbana Missions Convention three times. Roseveare died on 7 December 2016 aged 91 in Northern Ireland.