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The institution of British government has almost always been dominated by men. Until the 20th century, women simply weren’t allowed to hold active positions or vote. Constance Markievicz was the first woman elected to the House of Commons in 1918 but didn’t serve for political reasons, so the first woman to actually take her seat as an MP and serve was Nancy Witcher Langhorne Astor in 1919. The Duchess of Devonshire campaigning for Fox 1784. Female influence; or, the Devons-e canvas (BM J,3.35) https://www.britishmuseum.org/ picryl.com   150 years before this, the government of early modern Britain was exclusively run by men. However, just because women didn’t hold official titles or positions, didn’t mean that their influence on politics was negligible; quite the opposite in fact. Women were vital contributors to the goings-on of political society and were often integral in parliamentary elections and issues. Described by Elaine Chalus as “social politics” , 18th century women’s influential involvement was an important cog in the mechanics of men’s political careers.   Mary Mee was born between 1752 and 1754 to Benjamin and Elizabeth Mee. She was brought up in a modest household, as her father was a successful banker, but they were not part of the nobility; a situation that would quickly change in her adulthood. Mary had a thorough education growing up, bringing her love of learning as well as an acknowledgement of its importance to her household and children. Mary married Henry Temple, Second Viscount Palmerston on 7 January 1783. Her husband was an exuberant politician; a Member of Parliament for 40 years, he was a passionate Whig and subsequently a follower of Charles James Fox, Britain’s first Foreign Secretary and avid Whig statesman.   Mary placed great importance on education regardless of gender and was adamant all of her children receive a quality education in a variety of subjects. Mary shared an enlightened, liberal mindset and interests with her husband. This made its way into their household through political discussions, education, an awareness of the need to reform, and the cultured and erudite friends they kept. This was no doubt a strong, intellectual foundation for their four children including their eldest Henry John Temple, known as Harry.   Born in 1784, Harry would, in time, succeed his father and become the third Viscount Palmerston, and eventually Prime Minister of Britain in 1855. The key factor these two early modern political celebrities had in common was Mary. Henry Sr was already in the midst of British politics when he wed Mary Mee but with Mary by his side they continued to grow as an elite family with enviable political and social clout, as well as raise one of the most well-known Whig Prime Ministers of the 19th century. During his university studies Harry’s father passed away and he inherited all of the Palmerston land and titles becoming the third viscount Palmerston. Due to this rise in status, Harry no longer had to actually sit his examinations to pass but nevertheless, requested that he still did. This illustrates the importance he put on education and learning, just like his mother.   A large aspect of elite women’s lives was social, especially if their family was politically inclined. They would hold dinners and outings, attend gatherings, plays, weekends to country houses, balls; many with the hope of taking part in some political discussion or outreach, whether subtle or not. Women were the behind-the-scenes players when it came to politics. They would network, converse, and find the latest news, eventually relaying all of it back to their husbands. Mary was no exception, as her daily diary from 1791 shows a multitude of events attended and people met. On Thursday 10th February Mary writes “visited all ye morning”  on the 18th she “dined at Lord Malmsbury only Ly M Sir Gilbert . .”  and on the 20th  “went first to Lord Guildfords, then to ye first Sunday concert at Lord [Chestlys]” .   This is just a small selection of the types of entries in Mary’s pocket-book and they depict a very busy social calendar with members of elite society. She entertained many politically inclined friends, was familiar with the political events occurring at the time and took part in a multitude of occasions that were liberally motivated (as their household was). This would have provided the opportunity for her to interact with similarly minded friends and acquaintances, and likely discuss some form of political gossip or news. She frequently references dozens of Lords and Ladies of the nobility, either meeting them somewhere or hosting them in her home, exhibiting her social prowess and popularity.   Importantly, it wasn’t only ladies she entertained but men too. Many of these men and women were wrapped up in the politics of the day and Mary had constant access to their bended ears. She rarely mentions Lord Palmerston, begging the question if he was present for these engagements or not. If not, then it would have been up to her alone to socialise and, if needed, carefully politicise the conversation to either supply or gather information. This environment would have provided Harry with a strong foundation, understanding and comfortability with the political world.   The author David Steele for his ODNB  article on Temple, Henry John, third Viscount Palmerston  writes of Mary: “…Viscountess Palmerston, is a rather colourless figure beside her much older husband – equally well-meaning, but never quite at ease among the aristocracy.”  Based on her diaries and journals one could disagree about her colourlessness. Her manuscripts are filled with her many daily meetings, societal exploits, and local and international news, illustrating no lack of involvement among the aristocracy. Although one may have found her thoughtful disposition occasionally lacking the liveliness of her exuberant husband, it does not mean she was a bland, withdrawn, aristocratic housewife. In opposing instances, Mary has also been described as a lively, charming and elegant society hostess, who was witty and affectionate.   The Palmerstons were known for their enlightened life which included lots of travel, education, a love of the arts and social events. This worldly upbringing helped to shape the future PM, especially when it came to his foreign duties and policies. During his busy career, Harry spent a lot of time working for the Foreign Office and was widely acknowledged and celebrated for his role as foreign secretary, an important position during the peak of the British Empire. He was known for being opinionated, bold, open to new ideas and cautious. He possessed a strong nationalist attitude, prioritising Britain and its needs above all else and he worked with various countries and continents all around the world including Russia, Brazil and Africa. His work received both notoriety and nervousness; He was revered by a large portion of the British population, likely due to his nationalist tendencies, but left many members of government lukewarm about his actions and beliefs.   Mary and Henry took their four children on a four-year European tour in 1792. This tour alone would have enriched the minds of every member of the Temple family as they visited a multitude of countries and cities around Europe, absorbing and enjoying their landscapes, societies and cultures including significant events occurring at the time like the French Revolution. With such a diverse and fortunate childhood, it is no wonder Harry was so drawn to and successful with foreign politics. During his career he navigated Britain through years of tumultuous international conflicts. One such instance was the Opium Wars with China during the mid 19th century. As Prime Minister, Harry was partially responsible for the Treaty of Nanjing which ended the Opium Wars in 1842 and benefitted Britain wholly in respect to trade and put the territory of Hong Kong under British rule.   One of Mary’s journals clearly illustrates an interest she had in other countries and cultures. She used her journal almost like a commonplace book and copied out a selection of paragraphs from Bryan Edwards’ natural history book, The History, Civil and Commercial of the British Colonies in the West Indies, Vol I  from 1793. She clearly read the entire book as the selections she made are widely dispersed throughout, and she is undoubtedly very interested in the topics of natural history, geography and world history. These interests likely bled into her children’s education and possibly even to her husband’s enlightened learning. Harry’s choices throughout his political career point towards a passion for travel and global politics. In his early career as an MP, he was offered the prestigious position of Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1809 but refused, and instead took a job as the Secretary at War which was more focused on international dealings.   Another prominent influence in Mary’s life was her correspondent and friend Benjamin Thompson, Reichsgraf von Rumford. Rumford was a scientist, reformer, inventor and nobleman whom Mary and her family met in Milan in 1793 during their European tour. Meeting Rumford provided more opportunities for learning and exploration, especially for Mary. They became fast friends and began a correspondence that lasted 11 years until Mary’s death. They discussed all aspects of their lives, with Rumford sharing his array of ideas with Mary. These included: reforms for the poor, a new and more efficient fireplace for the home, and most notably his contributions to the founding of the Royal Institution in 1799, to which Mary was a devoted patron. This institution, still active today, desired to bring new science and technologies to the public.   Rumford had his new fireplaces installed into all three of the Palmerston’s homes and introduced Mary to some of his societal reforms regarding the poorer population as well as his famous soup recipe, which both no doubt inspired and possibly guided Mary’s philanthropic work. Rumford also gifted one of his diaries to Mary which depicted his travels and activities throughout Europe. This would have provided incredible insight into European events, politics and history, widening Mary’s already learned mind, along with anyone she shared it with. Mary, Henry and their children, would have benefitted greatly from having close ties to a friend like Rumford as well as friends and societies so integrated into the liberal and enlightened ideas of the day like the Royal Institution. Importantly, Mary is specifically noted to have shared many of the new, exciting ideas from the Royal Institution with her son Harry.   Unlike Mary’s journal, her pocket book did not have paragraphs copied from natural history books. It does, however, provide more insight into Mary and her family’s daily life and the ways she influenced them, through education, interests about the world, and otherwise.   The Palmerstons were likely aware of what was happening around London and England, being one of the elite families of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. This does not mean that it was expected for Mary to take a close enough interest that she would copy various news stories and events down in her daily pocket book. However, unsurprisingly, she did. She makes frequent reference to the war happening between Russia and Turkey, discusses a member of the elite who was recently arrested, and the arrival in England of an East India Company ship called the Indiaman which subsequently brought with it items she had ordered from abroad. This awareness of local and international events would add to a person’s knowledge base and equip them with the tools of fluent and impressive conversation when attending the social events of the season. This would have been a valuable skill Harry picked up from his parents.               Finally, one of the most important characteristics any parent can impart to their child is kindness. As a politician, kindness is not always a sought-after trait but injecting it into your actions can have an influential effect on the people you are serving. Harry has been described as having courage and humanity throughout his career and it is arguable that he learned these qualities from his mother, who was dedicated to her philanthropic work. Mary opened up more than one school, including a “school of industry”  just for girls, recognising the need for female education. She also opened up a “soup house”  (like a soup kitchen) and later, a sort of low-cost inn that provided meals for the poorer population. In her journal, she lists a recipe that uses potatoes to make more economical bread for those who couldn’t afford wheat. This might have been a recipe she kept for her soup houses to share with the poor she encountered.    Mary’s philanthropic endeavours came at a crucial time when there were severe food shortages throughout the country. Mary was very competent when it came to keeping account books and running businesses, which shows the proficiency that early modern women possessed, but above all else, was kind. A clear expression of Harry’s humanity came in 1818 when a frustrated man named Lieutenant Davies shot him in an attempt on his life. Despite this malicious-looking act, it was determined that Davies was mentally unwell and subsequently, Harry paid for the man’s legal defence. If Harry exhibited half of the generosity, humility and kindness that Mary demonstrated, there’s no doubt it would have helped him in social situations and his political career. It is possible it gave him more of an appreciation of all social classes and an understanding of what needed to be done to create healthier societies and a prosperous country. This doesn’t mean however, that Harry always made his political decisions with kindness in mind. He was known to be blunt and not afraid to risk conflict if it was in Britain’s best interest, as the Opium Wars with China illustrate. When it came to his home country though, he was passionate and had many goals to help the population including improving worker’s rights and pay.   Mary’s prioritisation and enjoyment of learning, travels, the enlightened friends she kept, her social clout , her ability to entertain and converse both politically and otherwise, and   her awareness, compassion and action towards the world she was living in, provided her with a greater understanding, appreciation and depth of character. These traits would benefit anyone in a position of power, especially where their decisions affected an entire nation.   There is no doubt that Harry, third viscount Palmerston and Prime Minister of Britain’s upbringing, rise to political power and popularity, were influenced greatly by Mary’s admirable intelligence, keen curiosity, educational encouragement, social awareness and prowess. Bibliography Brain, Jessica, ‘Lord Palmerston’, Historic UK , 2024 [accessed 19 November 2024] < https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/Lord Palmerston/#:~:text =He%20was %20a%20remarkable%20figure,and%20respect%20amongst%20the% 20voters.>   Chalus, Elaine, ‘Elite Women, Social Politics, and the Political World of Late Eighteenth- Century England’, The Historical Journal , 43, no. 3 (2000) pp. 669-697   Chlaus, Elaine and M.O. Grenby, ‘Elections in 18th-Century England: Polling, Politics and Participation’, Parliamentary History , Vol. 43, pt. 1 (2024), pp. 5–19   Connell, Brian, Portrait of a Whig Peer  (London: Andre Deutsch, 1957)   James, Frank A. J. L, “When Ben Met Mary: The Letters of Benjamin Thompson, Reichsgraf von Rumford, to Mary Temple, Viscountess Palmerston, 1793–1804.”  Ambix  (2023), 70 (3) pp. 207–328 < https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00026980.2023.2234717 >   Krspecialcollections, “Travels in Europe”, University of Southampton Special Collections , 4 September 2019 [accessed 8 July 2024] < https://specialcollectionsuniversityofso uthampton.wordpress.com/tag/mary-mee/ >   Palmerston Papers. Vol. I. Commonplace book of Mary, Lady Palmerston; after Nov. 1789. ff.ii+20. 155 x 105mm. Contemporary limp brown calf binding , BL, Add MS 59851   Palmerston Papers. Vol. II. Pocket-book journal of Lady Palmerston; 1 Jan.-31 May 1791. ff. 72. 180 x 115mm , BL, Add MS 59852   Sjmaspero, ““On myself I have spent but little, I have perhaps unwisely yielded too much to distress & to relieve others I have involved myself”: the philanthropic works of Mary Mee”, University of Southampton Special Collections , 20 March 2020 [accessed 7 July 2024] < https://specialcollectionsuniversityofsouthampton.wordpress.com/202 0/03/12/on-myself-i-have-spent-but-little-i-have-perhaps-unwisely-yielded-too-much-to-distress-to-relieve-others-i-have-involved-myself-the-philanthropic-works-of-mary-mee/>   Sjmaspero, “The stories they tell: Lady’s Palmerston’s rewards of industry”, University of Southampton Special Collections , 17 September 2020 [accessed 7 July 2024] < https://specialcollectionsuniversityofsouthampton.wordpress.com/tag/mary-mee/ >   Smith, E. A, "Temple, Henry, second Viscount Palmerston (1739–1802), politician and traveller"  Oxford Dictionary of National Biography,  23 Sep. 2004 [accessed 2 Aug. 2024] < https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-27111 >   Steele, David, "Temple, Henry John, third Viscount Palmerston (1784–1865), prime minister"  Oxford Dictionary of National Biography,  23 Sep. 2004 [accessed 2 Aug. 2024] < https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-27112 >

“I believe all Americans, no matter their race, no matter their sex, no matter their sexual orientation, should have that same freedom to marry. Government has no business imposing some people’s religious beliefs over others”. - Mildred Loving Mildred Loving, 1963 From innovation and upheaval to dire enforcements, the 20th century was the first century humanity would witness atrocities executed through diverse media. The world was plagued by dreadful diseases, famine, senseless wars, racism, and sexism, all within a one-hundred-year period. The United States of America—considered at the time a world leader—exhibited a duality of characteristics, nuanced by their effects in the name of progress. For context, slavery officially ended in 1865 in America, yet racial segregation became a deeply entrenched practice that reinforced racism and prejudice within the fabric of society, ultimately institutionalized through the Jim Crow laws. These laws perpetuated division, violence, and fear among Americans. However, as history has shown us time and time again, with hatred and pain also comes hope and love. One ordinary woman of color, Mildred Loving—whose very name spoke of affection—became the beating heart of a legal battle for love that would pose a historic challenge and reshape the discourse on interracial marriage forever. Mildred Loving changed U.S. law when the 1967 Supreme Court ruling legalized interracial marriage following her union to her white husband, Richard Loving. In this article, we delve into the life of this extraordinary woman, whose fight not only changed American law but also profoundly transformed American culture.  The birth of racism in North America  The “New World,” a term filled with optimism, ironically foreshadowed the contradictions and conflicts that would underpin American society. Between the 16th and 18th centuries, the brutal decline of Native American communities became drastically apparent, making indigenous peoples and their cultures increasingly rare. With this significant reduction, the New World—primarily through British colonists—introduced the first Africans to the Americas, establishing institutionalized slavery. The gruesome ramifications of slavery would endure for centuries. "The New World" was designed to favor white people and their descendants, while people of color were condemned to rely on a collective instinct for survival. Whether one identifies as Native American or African American, both heritages hold profoundly beautiful and rich traditions, which were, however, cast aside by the relentless power imbalance of the American legal system. Being both African American and Native American, Mildred Loving suffered from the palpable racism that was and is ingrained in American DNA. The 20th century was marked by extreme legal setbacks, with discriminatory laws and policies perpetuating racial inequalities and significantly limiting opportunities. This included anti-miscegenation laws (the prohibition of interracial marriage and, in some cases, the criminalization of interracial relationships)—that is, until Mildred and Richard Loving fought back against the deep-rooted American justice system.  The Loving’s Case  Compared to most, if not all, communities in the South, Central Point, Virginia (the home of Richard and Mildred Loving), was abundant in racial diversity.[1] Despite living in a state where interracial marriage was illegal and segregation was prevalent, this small community was made up of many multiracial residents, including white, Black, and Native American people. This may be because Central Point, Virginia, dating back to the 18th and 19th centuries, has an exceptional history of free Black landowners, which facilitated the establishment of a mixed-race community.[2] It would therefore not have been as peculiar for Mildred and Richard, being childhood friends, to eventually become romantically involved, fall in love, and want to get married and create a family of their own. On June 2, 1958, the Lovings quietly married in Washington, D.C. (a region that did not explicitly ban interracial marriages, unlike most Southern states that enforced such laws). After an intimate ceremony, the Lovings returned to their home in Virginia to continue living their ordinary lives together; they did not foresee the ordeal it would take for them to achieve that ordinary life. A little over a month after their wedding, at two in the morning, a blast of darkness entered their home, abruptly igniting their serene lives. The Lovings were arrested by the Caroline County Sheriff's Office and spent the night separately in cold, gloomy, confined jail cells. Convicted under Virginia law, which "forbids any white person and colored person from leaving the state for marrying each other and returning," Richard spent one night in jail, while Mildred, facing racial discrimination as a woman of color, was held for several days over the weekend. Once released, Mildred and Richard faced a formidable ultimatum from the judge, sentencing them to one year in prison—which the judge ultimately revoked—but instead banishing them both from their home state of Virginia. They promptly moved to Washington, D.C., where they raised their three children for just shy of a decade. However, the city's lifestyle starkly contrasted with the rural life they were so accustomed to, and the growing sense of isolation from their loved ones and familiar surroundings became overwhelming. The feeling of being out of place only intensified when their son, Donald, was struck by a car, narrowly surviving. It was at this moment that Mildred Loving and her husband decided to do what they deemed best to protect their family, returning to Virginia and facing the implications that their marriage signified.  The Lovings were not politically active, nor did they have any political aspirations; their fight was simply to love and live together freely, without restraints. They also did not have much money, certainly not enough to hire a lawyer. Yet, these limitations did not deter Mildred's determination to pursue her goal. Mildred's primary objective, alongside her husband, was to live peacefully. However, as circumstances evolved, her focus expanded to include a determination to challenge the legal system itself. Mrs. Loving boldly wrote to the United States Attorney General at the time, Robert F. Kennedy, pleading their case. I say "boldly" because both Richard and Mildred were introverted and reserved by nature. Unexpectedly, Kennedy replied to Mildred, saying there wasn't much he could do, but he referred her to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), where she wrote another letter. Bernard S. Cohen was chosen by the ACLU to represent the Lovings because of his expertise in civil rights law and his dedication to social justice. In conjunction with his co-counsel, Philip Hirschkop, Cohen played a crucial role in challenging the constitutionality of Virginia's racial segregation laws. Their years-long efforts eventually led to the Supreme Court's historic 1967 decision that invalidated laws prohibiting interracial marriage. "Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State. These convictions must be reversed."[3] This affirmed the Lovings' right to marry and marked a significant victory for civil rights in the United States. Cohen had stated in an interview before the case ruling by the Supreme Court that marriage is a fundamental right for men, but in our case, it is also the right of women.[4] Millions of couples have been impacted by the 1967 ruling; just three years later, it was reported that approximately 310,000 interracial marriages were recorded in the U.S. By 2015, this number had increased to over 1 million interracial couples, all stemming from Mildred and Richard’s legal confrontation.[5]  Redefining Activism: Human and Racial Equality  The complex case of the Lovings, which conclusively changed U.S. law forever, cannot be fully explained or interpreted in all its nuances, especially not within the scope of a single article. However, what I aim to highlight here is the quiet but determined spirit of Mildred Loving, whose steadfastness ultimately reshaped U.S. history. Despite the extensive coverage and significant legacy of American civil rights history, Mildred Loving remains underrepresented, especially in discussions of human rights activism. Her legacy is often overshadowed by more prominent figures, but her impact as a catalyst for racial justice cannot be overstated. Mildred’s resolute actions played an instrumental role in challenging the status quo and ensuring legal recognition for interracial couples.  Activism is commonly understood as taking action to support or oppose a controversial issue, and while Mildred Loving may not have been a central figure in the Civil Rights Movement, her role significantly challenges conventional definitions of activism. Mildred and her husband, Richard, made a powerful stand against laws that banned interracial marriages in many states. Their actions directly exposed the deep-seated racial injustices that were still prevalent in America. Mildred’s challenge to the law was not just about her personal freedom; it was a statement against the entrenched racial discrimination that affected countless others. As a woman of color married to a white man in the 1960s, her very existence defied the racial boundaries of the time. Through her courageous stand, Mildred became an unintentional advocate for love and equality, pushing back against prejudices that sought to keep people apart. Her unwavering commitment to the fundamental right to love without discrimination became a beacon for others striving for justice and fairness. Mildred’s decision to confront the law and speak to numerous diverse media, refusing to choose between legal constraints and her right to love, was not an act of submission but of bold leadership. In fighting against the establishment, they became the underdogs who triumphed, creating a movement that reshaped American history and gave new meaning to the fight for racial equality. Mildred and Richard were the first to legally marry as an interracial couple; for this statement to be made, the pair set in motion what civil rights leaders such as MLK Jr., Thurgood Marshall, and Rosa Parks, to name a few, sought and preached—the fight for equality and justice. Their fight, and Mildred’s advocacy for her and everyone’s right as a human being, shows her commitment to human rights above all else.  Although neither Mildred nor Richard Loving was formally involved in the Civil Rights Movement, their actions highlighted the pressing need for racial justice in America. Mildred should be seen as a human rights activist, as her legal and public efforts to secure the right to interracial marriage advanced the broader cause of equality, shifting both public attitudes and legal standards. In challenging social norms and discriminatory laws, Mildred Loving became an advocate for love that transcended race, gender, and societal expectations. “My generation was bitterly divided over something that should have been so clear and right. The majority believed what the judge said, that it was God’s plan to keep people apart, and that the government should discriminate against people in love. But I have lived long enough now to see big changes. The older generation’s fears and prejudices have given way, and today’s young people realize that if someone loves someone, they have a right to marry.”[6]  Love’s Triumph Over Prejudice  The 20th century ushered in a new era of profound change, marked by the defiance of traditional social constructs. In the U.S., women gained the right to vote in 1920, the first and second waves of feminism and the birth control movement were initiated, and both World Wars saw women rise into unconventional work roles. Moreover, women of color had to fight for decades longer than white women for voting rights, culminating in the 1960s when women of color took a leading role in the Civil Rights Movement7. Mildred's legacy—her fight to keep her marriage intact, particularly as a woman of color married to a white man in the 1960s—does not diminish her ethnicity, identity, or gender as a powerful, outspoken woman. Rather, it deepens the complexity of her struggle and her resilience, both personally and within society. Every time she spoke up, she quietly but powerfully proclaimed her belief in love without shame, in equality regardless of status, and championed individual human rights. Through all of this, she practiced self-preservation, advocating for equality and creating a better history for people of color in the United States, despite being in an interracial home. “I am still not a political person, but I am proud that Richard’s and my name is on a court case that can help reinforce the love, the commitment, the fairness, and the family that so many people—black or white, young or old, gay or straight—seek in life. I support the freedom to marry for all. That’s what Loving, and loving, are all about.”[8]  The Historic Loving Legacy  Mildred Loving had never sought or intended to expand the definition of what it means to be an activist, demonstrating clearly that one needn't have any political persuasions in order to fight for something. She stood against the Supreme Court not just for herself and her husband, but to advocate for the basic right to marry, no matter the race or gender. As she stated, "It's no longer just about me and Richard; it's about all the people who are treated unfairly just because of who they love."[9] She advocated during and decades after her court case and after the unfortunate, sudden passing of Richard in 1975. Mildred Loving's influence has extended to important Supreme Court cases that shaped LGBTQ+ rights and same-sex marriages in the 21st century, including Lawrence v. Texas, United States v. Windsor, and Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalized same-sex marriage. The U.S. Supreme Court directly cited Loving v. Virginia in two landmark decisions, Lawrence and Obergefell, to help decriminalize same-sex sexual activity and affirm the right to marry for same-sex couples. [10]   Mildred and Richard Loving after the Supreme Court Ruling, 1967 The Lovings are remembered every year on Loving Day, June 12th, the date the Supreme Court gave its historic ruling. It is a day to celebrate racial equality and raise awareness of the Lovings' impact. Mildred's legacy exceeds the law: she was a wife, mother, and human rights activist whose quiet, long-lasting strength continues to inspire. Her story is a powerful reminder of the lasting need for equality and justice, and of the incredible power and influence one revolutionary woman can have, no matter how introverted, in shaping the world.  1 Phyl Newbeck, Virginia Hasn't Always Been for Lovers: Interracial Marriage Bans and the Case of Richard and Mildred Loving , 1st ed. (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2005), chap. 2, 17. https://muse.jhu.edu/book/22628 .  2 "Virginia's Free African Americans, 1780-1865," The Virginia Historian ,  https://thevirginiahistorian.com/virginias-free-african-americans-1780-1865/ .  3 Chief Justice Earl Warren (Majority), Griswold v. Connecticut , 381 U.S. 479 (1965),  https://www.oyez.org/cases/1966/395 .  4 HBO Documentary Films, The Loving Story , directed by Nancy Buirski (HBO, 2011). 5 Pew Research Center, "Trends and Patterns in Intermarriage," Pew Research Social & Demographic Trends , May 18, 2017, https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2017/05/18/1-trends-and-patterns-in-intermarriage/ .  6 "Listening Again to Loving," Children's Defense Fund , 2007,  https://www.childrensdefense.org/listening-again-to-loving/ .  7 Leslie M. Alexander, "The Challenge of Race: Rethinking the Position of Black Women in the Field of Women's History," Journal of Women's History 16, no. 4 (2004): pg.53  8 "Listening Again to Loving," Children's Defense Fund,  https://www.childrensdefense.org/listening-again-to-loving/ .  9 Loving, Mildred. "Mildred Loving’s Speech Prepared for the 40th Anniversary of Loving v. Virginia ." QSaltLake , June 12, 2014.  10 HISTORY "How Loving v. Virginia Led to Legalized Interracial Marriage," Feb 27, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-qlS_J4Mho   Bibliography  Primary Sources:  Cohen, Bernard S. The Loving Story .   Directed by Nancy Buirski. HBO Documentary Films,   2011. 33 min.   Loving, Mildred. "Mildred Loving’s Speech Prepared for the 40th Anniversary of Loving v. Virginia ." QSaltLake , June 12, 2014.  Loving, Mildred. "Public Statement Submitted Just Before the Massachusetts Legislature’s   Historic Vote Reaffirming Marriage Equality, and Read Aloud at a 40th Anniversary Celebration   of the Loving v. Virginia Decision." 2007.   https://www.childrensdefense.org/listening-again-to-loving/   Warren, Earl, Chief Justice. Loving v. Virginia , 388 U.S. 1 (1967). Oyez. Accessed December 9,   2024. https://www.oyez.org/cases/1966/395 .   Secondary Sources:  Alexander, Leslie M. "The Challenge of Race: Rethinking the Position of Black Women in the   Field of Women's History." Journal of Women's History 16, no. 4 (2004): 50-60.   https://dx.doi.org/10.1353/jowh.2004.0074 .   HBO Documentary Films, The Loving Story , directed by Nancy Buirski (HBO, 2011).   N ewbeck, Phyl. Virginia Hasn't Always Been for Lovers: Interracial Marriage Bans and the   Case of Richard and Mildred Loving. 1st Edition ed., Carbondale: Southern Illinois University   Press, 2005. https://muse.jhu.edu/book/22628 .   Pascoe, Peggy. “Race, Gender, and Intercultural Relations: The Case of Interracial Marriage.”   F rontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 12, no. 1 (1991): 5–18.   https://doi.org/10.2307/3346572 .   Pew Research Center. "Trends and Patterns in Intermarriage." May 18, 2017. https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2017/05/18/1-trends-and-patterns-in-intermarriage/ .  Zimmermann, Richard G. "Virginia’s Free African Americans, 1780-1865." The Virginia  H istorian .   https://thevirginiahistorian.com/virginias-free-african-americans-1780-1865/ .

Words by Abby Louise Woodman Edits by Jillian Ducker Special thanks to Anya Pearson and MaryAnningRocks! The Statue of Mary Anning in Lyme Regis Anya Pearson is on a mission to redress the fact that whilst 85% of statues in Great Britain celebrate the achievements of men, only 3% commemorate named women. She began in 2018 when she and her daughter, then 11-year-old Evie, were inspired to start a campaign to raise a statue to Mary Anning in their community. Anning was a pioneering palaeontologist who spent her life collecting, identifying and selling fossils in Lyme Regis, a town on the Jurassic Coast, in Dorset. Mary Annning Rocks says that ‘It is important to remember and acknowledge Mary in a visual sense because she needs to have a tangible and physical presence put back in Lyme Regis.’ The initial campaign succeeded in their original mission of getting a statue of Mary Anning (and Tray the dog) installed on the 21st May 2022, the 223rd anniversary of Anning’s birth.  Mary Anning Rocks continues with the  Mary Anning Learning Legacy , and the campaign itself   has grown into a nationwide community led by Anya called VISIBLEWomenUK. Inspired by the efforts of Anya and the team in Dorset, campaigns working for a visual commemoration of women and their contributions to history have gained traction throughout the UK, including at home, in Dorset. Some of these movements include campaigns to raise statues to the Match Girls, in Bow, and Aphra Benn, in Canterbury.  I’ve followed Mary Anning Rocks from afar, and recently came across an article about Anya’s newest project, the Dorchester Sheroes . Last year, Anya was approached to advise on the raising of a statue to the man who invented the compostable toilet. She replied with what she describes as her usual polite rejection, listing the facts and statistics about women’s representation. To her surprise, the campaign organisers replied, well, then this needs to be a female campaign. Since then, Anya and the team have worked to find women who deserve a statue in Dorchester that will better represent and commemorate the women and people who have lived there. At the start of this year, they asked for ideas of the women they might feature, and in the end received over 48 submissions. Following the early success of the campaign, Anya is writing a book to spotlight as many of these women as she can.  In March 2024, I was lucky enough to meet Anya via video call to talk about all things Mary Anning, Dorchester Sheroes and what motivated her to activism.  About Mary Anning  Mary Anning, a Victorian woman whom you may know from the rhyme ‘She Sells Seashells by the Sea Shore’. Anning was born in 1799 in Lyme Regis, a small town in Dorset in the southwest of England, an area commonly referred to as the Jurassic Coast for its abundance of prehistoric fossils. It was common practice for locals to sell small fossils to tourists to supplement their income, something which Mary and her family participated in throughout her childhood. However, Mary’s dedication to and understanding of the pieces she found quickly made her a fundamental part of the development of palaeontology. Mary was 12 when she, and her brother Joseph, discovered the skeleton of an Ichthyosaur and by her twenties, Mary had taken on the leading role in the family’s fossil business. In 1826, aged 26, Mary opened her shop, Anning’s Fossil Depot, in which she displayed another Ichthyosaur she had found. She would continue to find and sell fossils, to tourists, wealthy collectors, and museums throughout her life. Mary taught herself much of the complex science and geology behind her finds, becoming (justifiably) resentful when the male geologists who published her findings did not mention her name in their work. Anning’s findings and scientific understanding of the fossils she uncovered contributed to significant developments about prehistoric life and the history of the planet. Mary Anning has come in and out of popular recognition from the time of her own life through to the present, often in children’s literature and recently, in a 2020 film starring Kate Winslet. Yet, on the coast where she spent so much of her life, Anning was unseen.  --- Why don’t we start with your background and how you found Mary Anning?  We did the Mary Anning Rocks campaign five years ago, and the statue [of Anning] was raised in 2022. [The reason] I came to that campaign; well it was a couple of things and it was the perfect storm.  I’ve always considered myself a feminist, and a bad feminist.  Because I always talked the talk, but I never really walked the walk. I was really inspired by Caroline Criado Perez’s campaign, [The Women’s Room Project], she’s amazing. It was following Perez’s journey on social media, and seeing the vitriol, and the negativity, and the quite hideous things that were happening to her, from mainly men. I just thought, wow, there’s nothing I can do about that. I’m never going to change that mindsight, it’s broken, those men are broken and there isn’t anything ever that we’re going to be able to do to change their perceptions. For me, as an educator, I thought, right, let’s look at the next generation.  When I started looking around Dorset, I mean, I do like the odd fossil, but it was really –if I’d been living in Manchester at the time, it would have been Emmeline Pankhurst, if I was living in Edinburgh, it would have been Doctor Elsie Inglis. I’d have been championing whoever that woman was that was in the town that I was living in. Mary Anning was in the right place at the right time for me and her to connect. But the main corner of the Learning Legacy – and it still is – is that it’s about working with children. From the get-go, with all the local schools and a local artist we wrote this creative project for them about women in science, and the outcome of that was designs to how they thought the statue could look, and ultimately those pictures, the ones we picked, led the artist.  That’s really amazing.  Yeah! It meant that they had that connection, they can look at it and know, I did that, that was my idea. All the fossils that are all over her skirt, that was a child’s idea, the overall composition of her striding out, that came from a child. Every single child put the dog in, so there was no way the dog wasn’t going in, even though the mayor of Lyme Regis wasn’t so keen. – Honestly, I could tell you some stories…  Go for it. Well first he tried to argue that there were so many more just as important people who deserve statues in Lyme Regis, not just Mary, and I thought I wonder if he’s going to give me a list – course he did – and he listed out all these men – men, men, men, men, men, men, men. They were all about war, army generals, or seafaring captains, and I just thought oh my god. He ended the email by saying that he considered her [Mary Anning] street furniture and that she would spoil the view. No, no that’s disgusting, are you serious? Oh yes. On the Maquette day, a year before the statue was unveiled [the model of the statue] so many amazing people came for the unveiling, all gathered around with the artist. He walked in in his regalia and said ‘it’s really beautiful.’ And this was in front of everybody. He said, ‘I’m really really disappointed that you’ve included the dog’ and everyone just started laughing because they thought he was joking, it’s like Punch and Judy, there’s no Mary without Tray. I knew he wasn’t joking, and I just lost it, and I said ‘why on earth would you say something like that? The dog’s even in her portrait! How could you not have the dog? Even the Natural History Museum does Christmas decorations with the dog !’ And do you know what his response wa s?  ‘We’ve got a dog fouling problem on the beach.’  I just walked away because I didn’t even know what to respond, and I said to the artist after the event, can we put a little copalite, a little fossilised poo, by the back of Tray’s paw, as a joke? She said brilliant, yeah let’s do it.  Oh my goodness, I love it.  That was Mary. Then last year, I got an email from the Dorchester heritage committee asking if I would help mentor and advise them on a statue campaign that they’d like to do in the town. They wanted to raise a statue to Reverend Henry Mule, who invented the compostable toilet.  Of course.  I thought, great that he invented the compostable toilet, but another man, and I just thought no. And I began this mentoring group about four years ago, called VISIBLEWomenUK, I mean we now have fifteen campaigns across the country, raising statues across the country. – one is for the Match Girls in Bow.  Oh wow, okay, I’m in Southeast London so that’s so close to me, actually.   Oh amazing! – They’ve been working on other ways of remembrance whilst they work on the statue, like Blue Plaques and things like that. And those girls [the Match Girls] were instrumental to changing employment laws. I’m used to getting people emailing me about statue campaigns and if it’s a woman I’m like, great, join the fold! But if it’s a man, I mean I’m polite about it, and I will reply with statistics – I’ve had two separate groups over the years approach me about [Percy Bysshe] Shelly, and I always go back with, but what about Mary? She wrote one of the most famous books in the whole world, but is there a statue for Mary Shelley, no, there bloody isn’t. So anyway, this email came through and I replied with the statistics, expecting not to hear anything back, because you often don’t, you’ve put people’s noses out of joint, you know? But this bloke did respond, he said ‘oh my god, I had no clue. That’s awful. Right, then this needs to be a female project then.’  The Dorchester Sheroes campaign are working to raise a statue to a woman from the area, they have recently shortlisted the suggested women to six, one of whom will be the subject of the statue. Touched by the volume of women submitted, Anya is also writing a book about the women nominated. I find it a bit mental that a man’s actually listened and changed - and it sounds awful but I’m a bit impressed?  Yeah, and he’s a very educated man, he’s a minority himself and therefore aware, so he got it. I had one meeting with him and we just got on like a house on fire and now we’re a team of four – initially the roll out was us asking, right who are these women in Dorchester? I swear I saw the number 48? Maybe this is me being a bit ignorant, but I didn’t really think there would be that many, it was a surprise when I read that in the article. Yeah yeah, well there was a criterion, of a 25-mile radius to Dorchester, which is the capital, and Dorset being the wider county. And that they needed to be inspiring and uplifting. Because, well, we have an awful history of hanging and burning women in Dorchester, and they’re crucial stories which shine a light on the judicial systems of the past. But we wanted this to be celebratory. The 48 includes women a bit wider than the initial parameters, there are some large hubs in Dorset so there’s a lot of history here and people are really excited by it. The book is going to be the Dorset Sheroes , to include as many of the women nominated as we can.  And do you have a favourite? Who are you most excited to write about? Well, because we’re focusing just on Dorchester at the moment, [for the statue],  we’ve got the final six and I’ll be happy if one of those wins. I think the one I’m most looking forward to, -she wasn’t born in Dorset, but she spent most of her life in Bournemouth - was the first ever black army officer to be made a major in the army – I, to be honest it’s so fresh I haven’t even done that much reading on her as she’s just popped into the inbox! I’m looking forward to digging deep with her. But the two, the favourites that I’ve got are quite personal. I’m in the fashion industry, so I really love the button makers, because that really celebrates a whole raft of women across two centuries and a really beautiful piece of art to commemorate what those women achieved with being able to forge their own careers and money, but also having something which marks the making, and the craft of their work. The other one I really love, and I am really hoping that she’ll win, is Sylvia Townsend Warner. Just because, I’ve read a couple of her books, and I mean, you have to stop yourself and remember the time she was writing these books. She  was just a young woman when she wrote her first book, Lolly Willowes , and it’s just brilliant. It’s about witches, but it’s a metaphor about women’s roles, and women’s sexuality – and of course, she’s a massive LGBTQ pioneer too. She openly lived with her lover, Valentine Ackland. It’s a really lovely inclusive thing.  I think it’s really interesting that women always go back to making things, producing things, and how society ignores that, even though it’s so fundamental. Like the way that embroidery at every level is often looked down on, especially in modern portrayals of history, as if that didn’t really matter. But, in reality, every single thing that they would have worn would have been entirely handmade, by a woman who had such incredible mastery of her craft, so I really think it’s important to focus on those women because craft is still looked down on as this arbitrary or artificial thing.  Yeah, and it wasn’t until Ruskin, William Morris that these art schools really changed – things like embroidery and knitting were really seen as art. When men get involved.  Yes, and it goes hand in glove, doesn’t it. It’s a woman’s thing, so it’s not considered real, or important.  I’m really excited to read more about them when it comes out.  One of the women that came out in the submissions was a woman named Rina Gardener, and she was a one-woman powerhouse. She was an artist and she ran her own publishing house from her kitchen table. Her books now sell for £3000.  Oh my god. Yeah! I wanted to get one of her books because I’m fascinated by her and I managed to find one at an auction, and that’s not an original, it’s a reprint from the early noughties, and even that was forty quid. That was a £12.99 book when it was first published.  She lived in Dorset, and she would walk all around an area, and in her books, she’d talk about all of it, not just Corfe Castle but the village, the farriers, the little church. She would hand paint and screen print, create these little illustrative books with chunks of writing about why we should be looking at this. I thought, this is what the Dorset Sheroes  book should be, very visual and collaborative.  How many women are you going to include in the book itself do you think? Well, I think I’m going to try and group them as much as possible, so Crime & Punishment, Makers & Creators, Theatre & Stage. But they’ll be callouts to the real important people, definitely the final six.  What motivated you to do this yourself? Firstly how did you learn about her and second why did you decide to do it yourself rather than just campaigning? If I’m honest, and hand on heart, the reason I got all into this was the menopause.  I woke up one morning and I was so angry, and so pissed off. I thought, I’m done. I was done with the erosion. Seeing what was happening, with the gender pay gap, what you could see coming with Roe vs Wade. I was done with it. I can’t do anything about that but from an educational point of view I can change how these kids see the world, from a different point of view, not just a male lens, constantly.  I think that says a lot about women’s experiences in society if I’m honest. I know quite a few women with huge health changes, like menopause, endometriosis, etc. So many things change when a woman’s health alters, both with the woman and how she exists but also in the way she’s treated. It’s something that’s not talked about enough.  I’m a very positive person, and we all get blue, a bit down, but I lost my confidence. I had anxiety. It manifested physically, I got electric shocks. And no one would listen to me, the GP’s, my husband, couldn’t understand. Speaking specifically about Mary Anning, when I was researching this issue, I really struggled with it. If it was up to you, what content or media would you put out there about Mary or any of the other women? I just want to see these women talked about more in conversation.  They are visually annihilated. When we launched the sheroes campaign it went into our local paper, and the first comment – I screen grabbed it because it was so excellent – the first comment was from Ron. Ron was obviously in his 60s, and he basically said it’s a false thing to retrospectively try to change history by forcing a statue when women didn’t really do anything of note until the twentieth century. And he genuinely believes that.  We’re doing this event with a load of authors and writers from the area, as a fundraiser, and I’m going to invite Ron. I really want to change his opinion, but me saying anything on the internet isn’t going to change that.  They [women in history] should be normalised in a way? Yes! I’m having the most unreal email conversation with the Manchester Museum at the moment. I’m originally from there so I was there recently visiting a friend, so we went and their display is great, they’ve got fossils, Ichthyosaurs. There’s this timeline on this cabinet and I’m going down, they’ve got [Henry] De la Beche [friend of Mary Anning], and all the usual suspects, but not one mention of the woman that found marine reptiles, nowhere.  I was going to say that’s baffling, but I work in museums and there are always women involved but they’re never written into the history properly.  I mean, even when I’ve said, we’re looking at pioneers for the first issue, so many people have said, well you can’t be writing that much then.  There’s so much! Manchester Museum – it gets better. I emailed as part of the Mary Anning Learning Legacy,  we’ve got quite a sizable fund that we can use to promote her. I said that I’d like to offer up some funding to help them promote her, because I know museums struggle for money. I heard nothing. Forwarded again a month later. Would be great to have an answer. I called them, I’m offering funding. Who do I need to talk to, to give you money?  A curator, quite aggressively, as if I’d said something personal, told me that they’re very proactive about putting women in the displays. But I hadn’t said that? I said, look I’m so glad you’re getting back to me, it’s great to talk to a female curator… She said, basically no.  Why? We don’t own any of Anning’s fossils. But do they own any of [Georges] Cuviers? Do they own any of De la Beche’s? If you do,  Mary Anning probably collected them anyway.  And you don’t need items in your collection to say the reason we know about this is because of this person.  You cannot have 3D Ichthyosaurs hanging from your ceiling without giving the person who discovered them credit.  I asked what about the timeline? She said that’s not part of her remit. But it’s a decal, it’s a modern sticker that you’ve put on in maybe the last five years.  There’s a huge issue across a lot of museums at the moment, there’s just no money there, and what suffers is the women.  The maquette has been on tour for a few years now, it’s booked until 2025 – a lot of the museums don’t even have fossils, but they’ve taken her and made these huge, amazing displays and Mary is the centrepiece.  It's fascinating that places that don’t have any connection to her want to give her a space but places that do, just nothing? Is there anything at the Natural History Museum? She’s named, there’s a wall of her and her findings, but it’s by a huge Plesiosaur which wasn’t hers, it was actually found in Yorkshire. It’s the same sediment, the same coast but it’s not hers! About five years ago they renamed the private members wing the Mary Anning Wing, and it’s got some of her archival work there too.  At Lyme Regis Museum they added a members wing there too named after her. Dorset Museum have a big display as well. They had a load of lottery money recently and they added her and Elizabeth Philpott.  Have you seen Ammonite (the 2020 film about Annings, starring Kate Winslet), and what did you think? Okay first of all, go and listen to my episode on the Cosmic Shed. In a nutshell, I think it was a lost opportunity, and I was disappointed that it wasn’t more about her achievements and how important she was scientifically. I read an interview with Francis Lee before the premiere, and they asked him where he got his inspiration for the character in the film the way that he did, and he had read two historical accounts from the time, one which described her as a vinegar face, pinched nosed, by Owens. Really awful and misogynistic. The other was in the diary of Lady Harriet, who had visited her, and she said that she had never met a young woman with such a glowing mind, self-educated who can hold her own in any male-dominated space. When you read it… Acknowledging that she’s working class and self-educated but can spin circles around these men of learning? Guess which one he went with? For me, she’s just always seen in the male lens, according to this recent book she was a failure because she never married and had children.  Mary Anning, and women are so much more than that.  — Ongoing VisibleWomenUK campaigns you can support The Sylvia Pankhurst Memorial Committee – www.sylviapankhurst.gm.apc.org The Elizabeth Elmy Group – www.elizabethelmy.com/ A is for Aphra – www.aisforaphra.org More than a Cell: The Legacy of Henrietta Lacks - www.bristol.ac.uk/research/impact/stories/hela-cells/ Friends of the Factories - www.friendsofthefactories.com/ The Matchgirls Memorial - https://www.matchgirls1888.org/the-story-of-the-strike Ada Nield Chew – www.statueforada.com Useful sources: Mary Anning Rocks, www.maryanningrocks.co.uk Denise Dutton (the artist), www.denisedutton.co.uk Mary Anning Goes on Tour! www.geologistsassociation.org.uk/maryanning/ Mary Anning, short film by Natashia Mattocks, www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1UOOC5zu1I Anya’s episode on the Cosmic Shed,   www.thecosmicshed.com/e/ammonite-1620737252/

Lee Miller (1907-1977) US Army official photograph. Lee Miller initially rose to fame as a model and surrealist, notably through her close working and personal relationship with artist Man Ray. However, Miller’s most profound work was created during her time as a war journalist and photographer. She spoke of this time so rarely that it was completely unknown to her only son, Anthony Penrose until he uncovered boxes of manuscripts and negatives in the attic of their family home after her death in 1977.   Born in Poughkeepsie, New York in 1907, Lee Miller’s relationship with the camera began at home. Her father was an amateur photographer and she often modelled for him throughout her early years. At just 19 years old, Miller began her modelling career through extraordinary circumstances. Whilst living in New York, she was almost hit by a car and was saved by none other than Conde Nast, publisher of Vogue  magazine. It was not long before she appeared on the cover of Vogue , and soon became interested in becoming a photographer herself. Her career as a model however was quickly derailed when Kotex, a period product company, used her image without consent. With little work available for a model who was the face of a period product brand, Miller decided to move to Paris and pursue photography. In Paris, Miller sought out Surrealist artist Man Ray and the pair would quickly become lovers and collaborators. They worked so closely together during this time that it is hard to decipher which artist made what work. Man Ray introduced Miller to the Surrealists, whose philosophy would profoundly influence Miller for the rest of her career. A key theme of surrealism that reoccurs in Miller’s work was the idea of the found object, where easily accessible objects are reconfigured or combined to create something new and interesting. For instance, whilst Miller was living in Paris she also worked as a medical photographer. On one occasion, after a mastectomy procedure, Miller asked the surgeon if she could take the woman’s breast that had been removed and place it on a dinner plate so that she could photograph it.   After she left Man Ray and Paris behind, Miller returned to New York to start a photography studio, which she also abandoned when she decided to move to Cairo in 1934 to marry Egyptian businessman Aziz Eloui Bey. Although she was not formally working at this time, she continued taking photographs, which are considered some of her best work. Growing bored of her life in Egypt, her husband suggested that Miller take a trip back to Paris to catch up with her many friends and intellectual circles. During this trip, she met artist Roland Penrose, who Miller would leave her husband for and move to London with.   While residing in London with Roland Penrose, Miller supported herself by working as a fashion photographer for Vogue. When the Blitz started in London in 1940, Miller began photographing the ruined remnants left behind by the bombing. In true Surrealist fashion Miller’s photographs captured comedic and absurdist elements of the bombed city, once again through the lens of the found object. The title of her photograph Bridge of Sighs refers to the bridge in Venice of the same name, where crossing prisoners would sigh at their last view of Venice before being sent to their cells. Miller’s interpretation comes in the form of a bridge created through the hollowed out remains of a bombed out apartment building. This version perhaps echoes the sentiment of the prisoners in Venice, with the citizens of London looking out at the city as the sun sets, not knowing what a night of bombing could destroy next. This photograph, like many others that Miller took during the war, highlights her ability to capture the absurd leftovers of the carnage of war without losing any sense of pathos for the tragedy. Lee Miller, Bridge of Sighs, 1940.    As an American citizen, Miller was prohibited from contributing to the British war effort. Instead, she captured the activities of women serving in the British royal navy, known as Wrens. Miller highlights the uncanniness of modern warfare by placing women behind fire safety masks and machinery as if they are a fashion accessory. In her 1944 image Behind the Sight ,  she photographs a woman standing in front of a mounted gun. This playful image blurs the woman into the gun and her smile perfectly aligns with the mesh of the gun sight. The metal below this appears like two breasts, perhaps commenting on the boundaries being crossed by men and machines during the war. Lee Miller, Behind the Sight, 1944. Just days before D-day at the suggestion of her friend, David Scherman, Miller signed up to be a war correspondent for the US forces. She soon found herself on Omaha Beach, covering a story about an evacuation hospital. Her first story was published in Vogue in August 1944 entitled 'Unarmed Warriors', where she captured pictures of nurses doing their daily tasks, surgeries in progress and the many wounded men waiting for treatment or waiting to be sent back to the UK. One burn victim asked Miller to take his photo because he wanted to see how funny he looked. Miller later said that it was “pretty grim and I didn't focus good.” Lee Miller, 1944. Initially, Miller was confined to the field hospital, as female journalists were prohibited from venturing to the front lines. However, Miller unintentionally broke this rule when she arrived at St Malo in Brittany, for a story that was supposed to cover 'how the Civil Affairs team moved in after hostilities to get things running smoothly again'. The press had published that St Malo had been 'captured but not occupied'. In reality, the Germans had just been isolated from the mainland and had to be driven back into the fortress. Due to heavy machine gun fire, Miller was not allowed near the action and instead joined a group of soldiers to watch from a hotel window, where she captured incredible images of distant artillery explosions as Allied forces laid siege on the German fortress. Lee Miller, 1944. Miller covered the Allied forces in France all the way through to the campaign’s success. She became the first female journalist present during the liberation of Paris and travelled extensively in Europe throughout the rest of the war, covering the German retreat through Luxembourg, and eventually into Germany itself. Towards the end of the war, with her friend and fellow journalist, David Scherman, Miller visited the recently liberated Nazi concentration camps Buchenwald and Dachau. Many of the photos she took of the camps were later destroyed but she saved enough that the horrific events would not be forgotten. Shortly after visiting Dachau, Miller and Scherman went to Munich and were staying at Hitler's apartment when the news of his suicide was announced. On that same day, the pair decided to stage a photoshoot in Hitler’s bathtub. In the picture, the bathroom’s white carpet was soiled by the dirt of Dachau on the photographer's shoes. Nearly a whole roll of film was used on pictures of Miller in the bath. However, one of the most poignant images is one of the last, with a skinny looking David Scherman, uncomfortably sitting in the bath looking at the camera. Scherman was Jewish, and the carefully aligned shower over his uncomfortable body holds a different meaning considering that days before the pair had witnessed the horrors of the concentration camps and the gas chambers. When the war ended, Miller struggled to return to England, emotionally shaken and angered by what she had witnessed. She continued to wander around Europe living on a diet of amphetamines, coffee and alcohol. She somehow ended up in a children’s hospital in Vienna. Her last photographs as a war correspondent were of children in this hospital, who were well taken care of with the cruel paradox of the complete lack of medicine available. She wrote to her editor, “for an hour I watched a baby die… this tiny baby fought for his only possession, life, as if it might be worth something.” Miller was haunted by what she had seen during her time in the war and was permanently changed when she returned to England, and was prone to alcoholism and periods of depression. She continued being a photographer for Vogue until completely giving it up in the mid 1950s, where her passion for photography turned to the kitchen and she became a gourmet cook. Lee Miller strongly believed her war photography simply documented the war - she claimed “I’m busy making documents not art”. Despite this, without her time as a fashion model and Surrealist, her wartime work would not have shown the war as brutally and honestly as it was. Her son wrote that 'being a Surrealist artist must be the only possible training to enable a person to retain their objectivity in the face of the total illogicality of War - to make sense of the nonsensical.' The images she captured are arguably some of the most important and poignant images of the last century, let alone the war itself. The full extent of her impact has only emerged after her death with the efforts of her son, Anthony Penrose and their relationship is explored in the excellent film, Lee (2023)   starring Kate Winslet that focuses on Miller’s time during the war.   Further Reading: Davis, Caitlin S. (2006) ‘Lee Miller’s Revenge on Culture: Photojournalism, Surrealism, and Autobiography.’ Woman’s Art Journal  27, no. 1, pp. 3–9. Hessel, Katy. (2019) ‘Ami Bouhassane on Lee Miller.’ The Great Women Artists Podcast.   How Lee Miller became such an influential force in Surrealist Britain  (2018) The Independent . Available at: https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/lee-miller-surrealism-uk-photo-man-ray-avant-garde-a8409826.html   Liu, J.-C. (2015) ‘Beholding the feminine sublime: Lee Miller’s war photography’, Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society , 40(2), pp. 308–319. Penrose, Anthony. (2005) Lee Miller’s war . London: Thames and Hudson. Salvio, P.M. (2009) ‘Uncanny exposures: A study of the wartime photojournalism of Lee Miller’, Curriculum Inquiry , 39(4), pp. 521–536. Sliwinski, S. (2011) ‘Air War and dream: Photographing the London blitz’, American Imago , 68(3), pp. 489–516. The big picture: Lee Miller’s Sphinx-like Blitz spirit  (2021) The Guardian . Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2021/mar/28/the-big-picture-lee-miller-self-portrait-with-sphinxes-vogue-blitz-second-world-war

Is historical fiction good or bad for women’s history? (Disclaimer: This article will include several spoilers for Doctor Who series 2 episode 4, and for the series generally, the episode came out seventeen years ago so I take no blame for spoiling it but I’d suggest watching this episode before you read on so you know what I’m going on about.) Historical episodes of Doctor Who tend to have a decent grounding in fact, screenwriters typically justify decisions of the Doctor to not kill Hitler for example, by stating that the history he was a part of, and therefore his death is a fixed point in time, changing it would create a paradox. So, typically when they tell us about history, they are overall correct, albeit with a sci-fi take. A resounding opinion among most Doctor Who fans is that the series two episode ‘The Girl in the Fireplace’ is one of the best. It has some of the best lines, who can forget Rose berating a drunk Doctor with “Oh look what the cat dragged in. The oncoming storm.” The plot is ridiculous: David Tennant slightly falls in love with the future Madame de Pompadour whilst Rose and Mickey discover that the ship is being fixed with human parts and that unbeknown to them, the clockwork mechanics want the brain of Madame de Pompadour because the ship is named after her. I remember watching this episode when it first came out, I was six, and this was before the history bug had fully grasped my attention (The Four Georges at the end of the first episode of Horrible Histories is to thank for that), but the fact that this was a historical episode that mostly focussed on a woman stuck with me, what I knew about history at that point was male centric and largely concerned war. As I got older and understood more about my place in the world, my identity as a woman and a historian, I questioned the popular (and lazy) idea that only people with obvious authority had power, meaning men. Throughout my undergraduate studies I became fascinated by the idea of the Royal Mistress, her political and social importance. Even now, we effectively have a Royal Mistress as our Queen Consort, so this isn’t a position that should be forgotten. In recent years and months, I’ve conducted a lot of my own research into the concept of the Maitresse en Titre, the chief of official mistress of the king of France, and the evolution of this role in the English court under Charles II too. I always come back to this episode, and the explanation of Madame de Pompadour’s life that the Doctor helpfully gives for an audience who might not have a comprehensive understanding of eighteenth-century France. On a side note, I was slightly disappointed that we didn’t get any real reference to her in the BBC series Marie Antoinette that recently came out, she was dead and replaced by du Barry by then but some acknowledgement that the Petit Trianon was built for her, or that she helped create the alliance with Austria that saw Marie Antoinette become queen would have been nice. Despite my fascination with Madame de Pompadour, and this episode, I hadn’t researched her in much depth until now. Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, or ‘Reinette’, lived from the 29th December 1721 to the 15th April 1764, she encapsulated what it was to be a mistress of the king of France, and the success of her personal influence is arguably unlike any before, and certainly after her. Interestingly, she wasn’t nobility of her own right, and her parentage was debated, making her a slightly controversial choice for Louis XV. It is partially this non-aristocratic background which garnered her criticism from her contemporaries and celebration from historians. Let’s start with her name, surely that can’t be too wrong, right? Well, the Doctor first meets Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, the future Madame de Pompadour through her fireplace in 1727, she’s meant to be six years old. She tells him that her name is Reinette, and it’s not until we meet her again as she leaves Paris, presumably to her marriage at nineteen that the Doctor works out exactly who she is. He helpfully exclaims “Reinette Poisson? Later Madame d’Etoiles! Later still Mistress of Louis XV! Uncrowned Queen of France! Actress, artist, musician, dancer, courtesan, fantastic gardener!” This is all factually correct, except for when we meet Reinette in 1727, she did not yet have this nickname, nor would she have been in Paris. At 5, in 1726, her legal guardian, Charles Le Normant de Tournehem (her mother’s lover and possibly her real father) sent her to be educated at the Ursuline Convent in Poissy, she didn’t return home until 1730, aged 9 with poor health. It was whilst she was ill that her mother took her to a fortune teller who told them that Jeanne-Antoinette would one day rule over the heart of the king. ‘Reinette’ literally means ‘little queen’ in French, and it became her nickname from then on, a good three years after she introduces herself by this name. It really wouldn’t have been hard to make the year 1730. Still, for narrative sense, maintaining one name is easier, we’ll give them a pass on that. In her teenage years she received an extensive private education, instilling in her many of the qualities that the Doctor points out: she was an accomplished actress, musician, dancer, and crucially a courtesan (basically a high-class prostitute) and a politician. There’s a significant part of her history missed; at nineteen, Reinette married the nephew of her guardian, (her cousin if Tournehem was her father), Charles Guillaume Le Normant d’Etoiles. On their marriage Tournehem disinherited the rest of his nieces and nephews, naming d’Etoiles (and consequently his guard/daughter) his entire estate. Within her marriage Reinette was seemingly content, they had two children, one who died in infancy and a second who died at 9-years-old. She is said to have stipulated that she would leave her husband only for the king, which she did in 1745. Doctor Who effectively summarises the influence of the Royal Mistress at the French Court better than a lot of other examples, in a simple scene where Reinette discusses the illness of the current mistress of the king, and her aspirations. Her friend, Katherine, says “Madame de Chatearoux is ill and close to death… The king will therefore be requiring a new mistress.” Reinette replies “He is the king and I love him with all of my heart, and I look forward to meeting with him.” “Every Woman in Paris knows your ambitions.” “Every woman in Paris shares them.” Now it might be slightly hyperbolic that ‘every woman in Paris’ had ambitions on being the mistress of the king, certainly not every woman would have had the position, education or ability, nor likely the self-belief to pursue this, but the sentiment is true. Maitresse-en-titre ‘chief’ mistress was a particularly sought after position for French upper-class women. The queen of France was always foreign, the Royal marriage typically a diplomatic relations matter; Mary Tudor had smoothed over English relations, Marie Antoinette would secure allyship with Austria, Catherine and Marie de Medici brought money, Marie Leszczyńska had been chosen because the country needed a quick heir. The mistress on the other hand, was always French, and was typically better at having the ear of the king than his wife. In many ways, the position of mistress was a domestic matter, and therefore, who she was, was also important to the court. Louis XV’s initial adultery had been encouraged on the basis that the mistresses he took were apolitical, as his councillors wanted to avoid Marie Leszczyńska having any sort of political standing. However, by the time he got to Reinette in 1745, this apolitical proponent appears to have gone out the window. Reinette met the king, officially, at the so-called Yew Tree Ball to celebrate the marriage of the Dauphin in February 1745 as the episode shows, but this was unlikely to have been their real first meeting. Since her marriage, Reinette would have had free reign to visit Parisian Salons, making a name for herself among the societal elite and likely being spoken about at Court, in 1744 she intentionally drove in front of the king’s path as he led a hunt near her estate in Senart, twice! Even if they didn’t speak, the moment made enough of an impression that the Madame de Chatareaux explicitly warned Reinette away from the king. Louis XV, for his own part, gifted her venison and invited her to the aforementioned ball several months later. At the ball, Reinette dressed as Diana the Huntress, to remind the king of their meeting, a bold choice which the episode doesn’t show particularly clearly. The Doctor explains, to the typically clueless Rose, that she is Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, and she is “ one of the most accomplished women who ever lived… she’s got plans on being his [the king’s] mistress” and that actually, she and the queen of France “got on very well.” So, is this accurate? Well, yes and no; she certainly was accomplished, if she was one of the most accomplished is probably a matter of opinion, but her patronage and participation in art, and crucially her activity in French politics was unlike the actions of even the queen at this time. She did become the king’s mistress, quickly being elevated to Maitresse-en-titre , by March 1745, Reinette had rooms directly above the king’s in Versailles, in May her and her husband officially separated, in June she was gifted the title and estates of the marquisate de Pompadour, and in September she was presented at court by the Princess of Conti. She cleverly pledged loyalty to the queen, allowing a friendly relationship to develop. I hasten to add that their relationship wasn’t rosy, the queen had simply resigned herself to her husband’s infidelity. Reinette benefitted because she wasn’t the most abrasive of his mistresses, and paid due reverence to the queen, it’s really understandable that Marie tried to protest her becoming a lady-in-waiting although unsuccessfully, would you want your partner’s partner among your closest companions? Reinette is a fascinating mistress because she only appears to have fulfilled the sexual role of her position for a few years, all sexual relationships with the king ended in 1750 due to poor health partially caused by 3 miscarriages in five years. Despite this, she remained court favourite until her death, she is regarded to have made herself invaluable for her patronage and political guidance. She was also open about her love for the king, disregarding any concern about the king’s sexual relationships with women at the Parc-aux-Cerfs that "It is his heart I want! All these little girls with no education will not take it from me. I would not be so calm if I saw some pretty woman of the court or the capital trying to conquer it." Pompadour’s comment seems a fitting sequel to the queen’s alleged comment about her that “if there must be a mistress, better her than any other.” Her artistic patronage is typically the easiest element to consider, she is the figure typically credited with popularising Paris as the arbiter of taste and culture in Europe, encouraged the development of the Rococo and as shown in the plans for Le Petit Trianon, its development into neo-classicism. (She unfortunately died 4 years before it was finished). Throughout her life she patronised Jean-Marc Nattier, Francois Boucher, Francois-Hubert Drouais, Jacques Guay; she also learnt engraving, becoming an amateur print-maker, and championed porcelain and the decorative arts. Her personal portfolio, including several of her engraving prints was rediscovered in 2016 and shows a woman who was not only an admirer of art but was personally accomplished in the field. “Uncrowned Queen of France” is again perhaps an overstatement, and it doesn’t appear to have been used much at the time, in stark contrast to descriptions of Barbara Palmer, Duchess of Cleveland and mistress of Charles II a century earlier. But the Doctor doesn’t use it here to disparage as Samuel Pepys did regarding Cleveland, so what accuracy does it have? Elise Goodman, a historian of Pompadour, has stated that by the mid-1750s, Reinette was effectively fulfilling a role of Prime Minister to the king, she was responsible for a host of political activities, including appointing advancements, favours and dismissals and was an active contributor to domestic and foreign policies. For example, it was her influence in 1755 which saw the development of the Diplomatic Revolution, which would ally France with Austria and eventually lead to the marriage of the future Louis XVI to archduchess Marie Antoinette. She was also the subject of criticism for actions and political steps which arguably led to Britain overtaking France as the leading colonial power. Many libels came in the form of ‘poissonades’, pamphlets which criticised and shared rumours. But they appear to have had little effect on her predominance at court, she was not replaced as Maitresse-en-titre until four years after her death, there were mistresses, but not someone to begin to fill Pompadour’s place until Madame du Barry made her entrance, but she’s a discussion for another day. The episode does well to reflect her seniority at court and the importance she held on Louis XV, the last time the Doctor tries to visit her she is taken away from Versailles in her coffin, it is pouring with rain as it was in real life (knowing this was filmed in Wales I wonder if they planned this scene or if it was a happy coincidence). The downpour was something that her critics described as befitting her ending, as if a sort of pathetic fallacy. In this final scene in eighteenth-century France, the king hands over a letter, and when the Doctor refuses to share its contents, he says “ Of course. Quite right ” demonstrating simply and quietly his accurately displayed reverence Louis XV had for his penultimate Maitresse-en-titre . The episode doesn’t exactly intend to go into depth about Madame de Pompadour’s successes, but it does gloss over the intricacies of a lot of her achievements, the main characteristic of Doctor Who’s Madame de Pompadour is that she is brave, empowered, and single-minded. This appears fair, if one-dimensional. With any depiction of women’s history, I always question how well it has been written, excusing accuracy or inaccuracy, does it deal with the themes well? Perhaps because the concept of this episode is to provide sneak peeks at her life, there are a lot of details ultimately left out of the narrative, her children, and her miscarriages, for example, fail to be mentioned. These deaths, and health problems would have had a profound effect on her life, and likely her mental well-being, that there is no mention of them, even when she is visited by Rose in what would have been a year after her daughter’s death at the age of nine, she is instead entirely practical, and it does come across as uncaring, which feels like an oversight. Moffat’s inspiration, among other facets like ‘The Turk’ (an eighteenth-century invention which was apparently a machine able to play a real-life human opponent at chess), appears to have been The Moberly-Jourdain incident. I won’t go into detail about this here but it’s worth having a read about when you can. The episode obviously caters towards entertainment before it does education, and in terms of time-travel and science fiction, it does a decent job of creating a not believable but surprisingly empathetic heroine. Even more remarkably, somehow making Louis XV out to be a somewhat decent person and not a serial philanderer who created a political climate so tempestuous it ended up with his grandson getting his head chopped off. If we consider the entertainment on the side of the Hist-Fic, it is generally good, the use of Welsh country-houses to recreate Versailles does an alright job of setting the scene, although unconvincing at demonstrating the extent of her artistic prevalence in this period. In my opinion, the clockwork monsters are an impressive way of calling to both the historical period and the entertainment intended, specifically their slightly terrifying masks are even if not intentional, a nice reference to the fact that Reinette first officially met Louis XV at a masked ball. I’m always wary in historical fiction of exactly how ‘feminist’ writers have made their historical women, as a feminist and a woman’s historian, that might be a slightly strange thing to read. But I’m of the opinion that women in history do not necessarily need post-humous empowerment, often, the most feminist thing to do with a woman’s history is to tell it exactly how it happened, with full transparency for her actions and flaws and struggles. Often that is not particularly empowering. Reinette is, as most Moffat-written women are, slightly intimidating to the men around her, in a way that if we were discussing another woman in eighteenth-century France, I might say is incorrect, but for Reinette, intimidating is right, she was a self-constrained woman, she knew her place in her world and she clearly knew how to engage with the constrictions of the society she lived in. Moffat’s Reinette is undoubtably a bit anachronistic, you’d be hard-pressed to find any woman in hist-fic who isn’t, but she is a fair representation of this woman for the twenty-first century. This series asks “Is historical fiction good for women’s history?”, for this case, I’m going to say yes. She isn’t entirely accurate, and the sensitivity of her story falters in oversight of her life not pertaining to a fictional relationship with the titular Time Lord, but in a 45-minute Doctor Who episode it’s understandable that a mother grieving would be cut for clockwork monsters. It’s fantastical and ridiculous, but crucially, it doesn’t pretend not to be. The Girl in the Fireplace has stuck with viewers, and so I am inclined to argue that yes, she deserves a lot more attention and care, but how many people know Madame de Pompadour’s name because David Tennant shouted that he snogged her in 2006? Me, for certain. To watch the episode or read more about Madame de Pompadour, see here: Doctor Who, Series 2, Episode 4: ‘The Girl in the Fireplace’, BBC, https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0074fmn/doctor-who-series-2-4-the-girl-in-the-fireplace?seriesId=b007vvcq ‘The real Madame de Pompadour’, The National Gallery, < https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/learn-about-art/paintings-in-depth/the-real-madame-de-pompadour > Stamberg, Susan, ‘More than a Mistress: Madame De Pompadour was a minister of the arts’, National Portrait Gallery, (10/05/2016), < https://www.npr.org/2016/05/10/477369874/more-than-a-mistress-madame-de-pompadour-was-a-minister-of-the-arts > A recent episode of the History Hit Podcast Not just the Tudors with Suzannah Lipscomb discussed Louis XIV and his mistresses, it gives a really good insight into the phenomenon of the French Royal mistress, go and have a listen!

Isabella of France 1295-1358 The Hundred-Year War started because of a woman. In 1295 or 1296 Queen Joan I of Navarre (a medieval Basque kingdom in Northern Spain) gave birth to a child called Isabel. The daughter of an autonomous queen and the king of France, Phillip IV, Isabella was by all accounts, destined to be a queen, but typically she would be refrained from being so in her own right. Her father arranged marriages between Isabel’s aunt, Marguerite, and the current king of England, Edward I, and his infant daughter and child prince Edward, ensuring French influence in England for at least two kings’ reigns. The marriage between Isabel (then anglicised to Isabella) and Edward II took place in 1308, the king was 24, and his queen 12, perhaps understandably, he showed little interest in his child-bride, but plenty in formerly exiled favourite Piers Gaveston. Several historians have debated the exact nature of the relationship between Piers and the king, if it was homosexual, there is little to disprove it, but also, there is little to prove it. Homosexuality was not exactly unheard of, but it wasn’t shouted about either, crucially, when Piers was brought out of exile, a chronicler wrote that ‘He [Edward II] had home his greatest love.’ We may not know the exact nature of their relationship, but much like Anne of Denmark in the seventeenth century, Isabella found herself often ousted in favour of the male favourite: Piers had received a portion of Isabella’s dowry, he was put in charge of the new queen’s coronation, at the event itself he was seated next to the king, rather than her, his coat of arms, rather than Isabella’s was also displayed. If it wasn’t a homosexual relationship, it certainly was a queer one. Piers Gaveston was exiled, then returned within eighteen months, with him and the king fleeing north from the barons who had enforced the exile with a pregnant seventeen-year-old Isabella in tow. She was safe when they left her to escape on a ship, and by the summer, Piers was murdered. In the months that Piers had not been at court, Isabella had fallen pregnant, so you’d hope, for the teenage queen’s sake, that without him, things would settle down. Alas, not. In came a man named Hugh le Despenser, described as hating the queen even more than his predecessor, by 1321 she was practically imprisoned, and by 1324, all of her lands had been given to the new royal favourite. Until now, Isabella looks pretty weak, and abused, so you may be wondering, how on earth could she have started a war, and why on earth is this article titled ‘The She-Wolf of France’? Well, let's firstly give Isabella some grace for being a child in her marriage, sent to a country she did not know, living in practical poverty despite being the queen of England and having a child at 16 or 17, followed by four more children. There is somewhat of a turning point in Isabella’s life when she is allowed marginal freedom and autonomy in 1325. Her husband pushed Isabella to return to France on his behalf, to negotiate with her brother, now king of France, for Gascony, a duchy which had been brought to the English crown by Eleanor of Aquitaine (a duchy which the king of England continued to hold). The French king had declared Gascony forfeit for Edward’s failing to pay homage, and to put it simply, Edward wanted it back. Isabella convinced her husband to allow their son, prince Edward to travel with her, a move which rendered the negotiations successful as he was able to pay homage in place of his father. However, her intention in taking her son may have had a more rebellious intent, as once in France, Edward II demanded the prince be returned to England as if suddenly realising that this prince was his heir. In France Isabella and the soon-to-be Edward III was joined by Roger Mortimer, an English exile, the king’s half-brother, Edmund of Woodstock, and several Englishmen who were disheartened with the king and his favourite. Isabella found financial support in Hainaut, began a romantic and sexual relationship with Mortimer, and arranged a marriage between her son and Phillipa of Hainaut. Here she also (and this is crucial for later) gave up any claim she had to the French throne. Isabella’s rebel army returned to England in 1326, landing in Suffolk. Her husband was quickly captured and Edward III, then fourteen was crowned, with his mother as regent. Isabella ruled on behalf of from 1327 to 1330 and remained an advisor to her son. As for the now previous king, he wound up dead in 1327, legends say at Isabella’s own hand by a red hot poker, or strangulation, his lover(s), were hacked apart and/or dragged, hanged, drawn, and quartered. ‘She-Wolf’ is making sense now. In 1328, Isabella’s brother died, and the French throne faltered, he had produced no heir, and after a decision to keep the line distinctly French, the crown to the Valois line for the first time. Now you might be thinking, okay well that is fine, remember Isabella gave up any right to the throne in 1326? Well, Edward III and his mother disagreed, they thought that the French throne should stay Capetian, and as Isabella couldn’t rule anyway (Salic Law prevented her even if her actions in 1326 are disregarded), her son was already a king, and was a grandson and nephew of kings of France, he was also Capetian through his mother and a descendant of several French nobility who had far greater exposure to the French throne than the new Valois king. The French consistently rejected Edward’s efforts, for one, whilst the English loved her, the French hated Isabella, considering her ‘depraved’ and not wanting her near the throne. These tensions were heightened because in 1331 Edward III had arrested his mother and her lover Mortimer, trying, and executing him. Isabella was placed under house arrest, and then became a nun, so claiming the throne through his mother was perhaps not the greatest standpoint for Edward’s efforts when he declared himself king of France in 1337. Sources: ‘The Wild Life of English Queen Isabella, She-Wolf of France aka the Rebel Queen Who Killed the King of England’, Ancient Origins, (30/12/2018), < https://www.ancient-origins.net/history-important-events/isabella-france-0011247 >, [30/03/2023] Weir, Alison, Isabella, (London: Vintage Publishing, 2012)

‘My life has been built around sex and liberation’. Marsha P. Johnson is undoubtedly one of the most recognisable figures of LGBTQ+ history. Synonymous with the gay liberation movement of 1960s New York City. Assigned male at birth, Johnson is perhaps best known for being the black transgender woman who threw the first rock at the Stonewall Riots. Although Johnson herself has corrected that, she was not the person who started the fight, that doesn’t stop her from being at the centre of the liberation movement, and perhaps she remains significant simply as a figurehead of a pivotal movement in LGBTQ history. This article will discuss Johnson’s own history, and whether it is problematic to assume she was trans. Johnson was born on August 24, 1945, in Elizabeth, New Jersey to African-American, Methodist working-class parents, as one of seven children. She attended the Mount Teman African Methodist Episcopal Church throughout her childhood, she would remain a practising Christian throughout the rest of her life, later describing herself as ‘married’ to Jesus at sixteen. She had dressed in dresses throughout her childhood, adopting something of an androgynous identity, as we might call it today. This ended when she, after years of bullying, was sexually assaulted by a 13-year-old boy. Her mother, rather confusingly, told her that being gay was to be ‘lower than a dog’, whilst also telling her to go and find a rich boyfriend. Her life altered when she moved to Greenwich Village, New York at 17, returning to wearing women’s clothing and choosing the name Marsha P. Johnson (the P meant Pay it no mind and is an interesting call back to Susan B. Anthony and her sister’s decision to include initials in their names). New York was still heavily against gay people, often criminalising otherwise innocent activities in efforts of persecution, yet, within ‘The Village’, and the now infamous Stonewall Inn, this period may have been a point of liberation for Johnson. She immediately began working as a drag queen, saying in 1992 that she was ‘no one, nobody… until I became a drag queen.’ Day to day she favoured colourful outfits, thrift stores and flower crowns, an exaltation of feminine identity. She also, as many young people do, found her people in her move, becoming ‘like a mother’ to a transgender girl named Sylvia Rivera, and making friends kind enough to let the homeless Johnson sleep on their sofas. Poor and gay, she was forced to turn to sex work to supplement her income, where she was often abused by clients. She would later describe her life as ‘built around sex and liberation’. The most famous moment of her life, shortly before her 24th birthday, on the 28th of June 1969, saw the Stonewall Inn raided by police. It is often perpetuated that Johnson began the riots as police began arresting the gay men in the bar, but she herself has corrected this, clarifying that when she and Rivera arrived it was already 2 am, the place was on fire, ‘The riots had already started.’ Whether Johnson was being completely honest or not, in the weeks and months following, she was one of the leading figures of the following explosive gay rights movement. A year later, the first Gay Pride Parade took place, as a protest led by a group of gay rights groups: the Gay Liberation Front, (radical) and the Gay Activist Alliance (moderate). Johnson and Rivera instigated STAR, Street Action Transvestite Action Revolutionaries frustrated by the general exclusion of transgender and people of colour. Johnson and Rivera’s organisation is clearly keenly inspired by their own histories, exemplified by the opening of STAR House, STAR was “an organization dedicated to sheltering young transgender individuals who were shunned by their families.” Throughout the 70s, Johnson began to receive more visibility; notably, she performed with the drag group ‘Hot Peaches’, and modelled for Andy Warhol. Her motivation in all was clear, that gay people across America would have their rights, and she would not rest until every gay person did: “as long as gay people don’t have their rights all across America…there is no reason for celebration.” Throughout the 70s and 80s Johnson’s activism was interspersed with mental health breakdowns and subsequent stays in psychiatric facilities, arrests and sex work. In 1990 she was diagnosed with H.I.V., characteristically speaking publicly about this in June 1992. Tragically, less than a fortnight after this interview, she was found in the Hudson River. 1992 was at that point, the worst year on record for anti-LGBTQ+ violence, and rulings of suicide were abhorrent to her friends. Police would reclassify the case as undetermined, but refused to investigate further, nor did the media both covering her death. Despite this, hundreds turned up to her funeral. It took twenty years for the New York Police Department to reopen the case. Johnson and Rivera’s legacies were not forgotten, in 2019 they became the subject of a monument titled ‘She Built NYC’, and in 2020, New York State named a park in Brooklyn after her, she remains synonymous with the LGBTQ+ movement, regardless of whether she threw the first brick or not. To turn to the question of her identity, Johnson described herself as gay, and a transvestite, she used she/he pronouns. The word ‘transgender’ was not as widespread as it is now, she is never known to have used the word herself, but it wasn’t unheard of. There is an argument that applying modern terminologies, in this case, a transgender identity, onto someone who would not have understood it, or in this case, perhaps knew that this was not her identity is damaging to that person’s historical memory. Furthermore, we do know that she identified as a drag queen, a transvestite, and gay, and attaching those experiences to one of a transgender person is trivialising all of the above identities. Perhaps given more time, Johnson may have recognised this in herself, or perhaps with her she/he pronouns a gender-fluid identity would have suited her. Unfortunately, we’ll never quite know, but that doesn’t reduce her impact on LGBTQ+ history, and I for one think that regardless of her exact gender identification, she deserves recognition during Women’s History Month. Binion, Billy, ‘ Marsha P. Johnson Probably Didn't Start Stonewall, and Might Not Have Been Trans. Does It Matter?’, reason, (30/06/2020), < https://reason.com/2020/06/30/marsha-p-johnson-didnt-start-stonewall-pride-might-not-have-been-trans/ >, [29/03/2023] Rothberg, Emma, ‘Marsha P. Johnson’ National Women’s History Museum . (2022), < www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/marsha-p-johnson >, [29/03/2023] ‘Life Story: Marsha P. Johnson’, NY Historical Society, < https://wams.nyhistory.org/growth-and-turmoil/growing-tensions/marsha-p-johnson/ >, [29/03/2023]

‘Unbought and Unbossed’ are the two words Chisholm described herself within the publication of her autobiography, the title her life’s motto. This sums Chisholm up entirely, demonstrating unique outspokenness for women and for minorities throughout a period of U.S. and global history which in every moment rejected Chisholm’s place in the world. The difficulties of her race and her gender (something she stated was a ‘double handicap’) do not appear to have shaken Shirley Anita St. Hill Chisholm too much however; she was the first African American woman in Congress in 1968 and the first African American to seek nomination for U.S president from either of the two major political parties in 1972. This profile gives an account of Chisholm’s life, looking into what brought “Fighting Shirley” into the Congress floor, and also what kept her there. Born in November 1924 to immigrant parents in Brooklyn, New York, Chisholm and her younger sisters were sent into the care of their maternal grandmother in Barbados at the age of five, her parents too busy working full time to care for their young children. She returned to New York in 1934 at the age of fifteen. Her time in Barbados gave her a pronounced accent which she retained throughout her life and as for the influence of her grandmother, Chisholm would say in adulthood that her grandmother gave her ‘strength, dignity, and love. I learned from an early age that I was somebody. I didn’t need the black revolution to tell me that.’ Chisholm also credited much of her success and intelligence to this upbringing, citing it as ‘strict, traditional’. Whilst in Barbados, Chisholm was exposed to a number of anti-colonial independence movements, whilst her father supported political activist Marcus Garvey in New York. On her return to New York, she attended an integrated school in Brooklyn from 1939, doing well enough academically to be named vice-president of the Junior Arista honour society. She was then offered scholarships at Vassar and Oberin Colleges, though she eventually chose to stay in Brooklyn, where she earned her Bachelor of Arts with a major in sociology and a minor in Spanish. During her time at the college Chisholm directed her energy into the Harriet Tubman Society, where she promoted the inclusion of black soldiers in the U.S. military, African-American history modules at the college and more women in the student body Government. Following graduation, Chisholm worked as a teacher’s aide a th e Mt. Calvary Child Care Center in Harlem from 1946-1953. At the same time, she was attending classes at night to earn an MA in childhood education from Teachers College of Columbia University in 1951. After leaving her job in Harlem, Chisholm became the director of the Friend in Need Nursery in Brooklyn, and from 1954 to 1959 the director of the Hamilton-Madison Child Care Center, in lower Manhattan. Most notable is of course, her career in politics, starting from 1953 Chisholm engaged primarily in black focussed politics, starting with the BSPL which had originally sought to elect the first black judge in Brooklyn and later to support civil rights, protest racial discrimination and improve financial services in Brooklyn. She would eventually clash with the group’s founder Wesley Holder over her effort to give female members more input. In the next few years, she would work for the Brooklyn Democratic Clubs and the League of Women Voters, the Political League, and the Brooklyn branch of the National Association of College Women, then, in 1960, the Unity Democracy Club, a racially and gender-integrated organisation, here working with Thomas R. Jones who she would later replace as the Democratic Primary in the New York State Assembly in 1964 despite initial opposition according to her race and her gender. Thus, Chisholm was a member of the NY State Assembly from 1965-1968, using her time to extend domestic workers, sponsoring the introduction of a SEEK programme in New York (Search for Education, Elevation and Knowledge), and arguing against the state’s English literacy test as if someone “functions better in his native language … [it does not mean they are] illiterate”. In 1968 Chisholm moved from state politics to national, running for the U.S. House of Representatives from New York’s 12th congressional district which thanks to some redrawing of congressional districts was dominated by black voters. Winning with her slogan “Unbought and unbossed”. Chisholm became the first black woman elected to congress, sitting as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for seven terms, during which time she consistently promoted racial and gender equality, support for the working classes and poor population, lobbied against the Vietnam War and introduced 50 acts/legislation. Furthermore, she was unwilling to let her success in politics be anomalous, in 1971 Chishom co-founded the National Women’s Political Caucus which continues to recruit, train and elect progressive, pro-choice women in American politics. Chisholm for president Chisholm announced her candidacy for president in January 1972, calling for a ‘bloodless revolution’ a the upcoming Democratic nomination convention. She became the first African American to run for a major party’s nomination for the presidency and the first woman to run for the Democratic party’s presidential nomination, although crucially she refused to run as a ‘black candidate’ or a ‘female candidate’. “I am not the candidate of black America, although I am black and proud. I am not the candidate for the women’s movement of this country, although I am a woman and equally proud of that. I am the candidate of the people and my presence before you symbolises a new era in American political history.” Chisholm’s effort was, perhaps unsurprisingly, unsuccessful, hugely underfunded and mostly considered to be a symbolic rather than genuine candidate, she stated later that in her political career, she encountered more discrimination as a woman than for being black. Unlike some other women we’ve discussed so far this month, she did however have the full support of her husband, who at the start of her candidacy served as her bodyguard. Her support was based upon those who were ethnically diverse and were largely women, and whilst generally popular politically, she struggled to gain the popular vote. Throughout the campaign, Chisholm had struck up an unusual friendship with her political rival George Wallace. This friendship would later serve her political work well, helping her to push through legislation to give domestic workers the minimum wage. Post presidential campaign From 1977 to 1981 Chisholm served as Secretary of the Democratic Caucus, then worked to help inner-city residents, invest in education, health care and other social services, worked to reduce discrimination against women and Native American land rights and for the better. She would oppose the Vietnam War, the U.S. draft and weapon developments, and support the Equal Rights Amendment, although specified that women should not receive specific health and safety laws as this would simply ‘continue’ traditional discrimination of women. She would focus on the “double discrimination” faced by black women, which some historians have argued had an impact on the development of the feminist movement in the 1970s. However, many others considered her too ineffectual in cases of liberal, black and feminism issues, for example, Chisholm would not support Bella Apzug’s campaigns for U.S. senator and New York mayor in 1976 and 1977 respectively; nor Elizabeth Holtzman’s congressional challenge; nor did she support Percy Sutton’s mayoral effort, also in 1977. The press began to call her apparent ignorance of black and women's issues the ‘Chisholm problem’, and critics focussed on the ‘unbossed’ part of her slogan, arguing in disparaging articles that bossed was exactly what she was. There are several reasons Chisholm may have decided to leave congress in 1979, her second husband had been in an accident, and the “Reagan Revolution” pushed liberal politics into a fairly unlikeable place. She retired officially in 1982, leaving congress entirely in 1983 and settling back into a career in education. She didn’t exactly leave politics behind though, establishing the National Black Women’s Political Caucus in 1984 with C. Delores Tucker (The organisation would later become the National Congress of Black Women), she would continue to campaign for politicians and also helped set up the group: African-American Women for Reproductive Freedom in 1990. Bill Clinton would go on to name her Ambassador for Jamaica, in 1993, though she was ultimately too unwell to undertake her role. Chisholm died on the 1st of January 2005, the inscription on her legend reads “Unbossed and Unbought ”. Sources Hill, Debra, ‘Shirley Chisholm (1924-2005)’, National Women’s History Museum, (2015), < https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/shirley-chisholm >, [26/02/2023] ‘Shirley Chisholm (November 30, 1924-January 1, 2005)’, African American Heritage , < https://www.archives.gov/research/african-americans/individuals/shirley-chisholm >, [26/02/2023] ‘Shirley Chisholm for President’, Smithsonian, < https://nmaahc.si.edu/shirley-chisholm-president >, [26/02/2023] ‘Shirley Chisholm’, History.com, (18/12/2009/13/04/2022), < https://www.history.com/topics/us-government-and-politics/shirley-chisholm >, [26/02/2023]

Mary Frith, AKA “Moll Cut-Purse” 1584-1659 Mary Frith, better known as “Moll Cutpurse” is one of those historical figures that often feels too elusive to properly pin down. Her crimes are fairly well-documented thanks in part to the Newgate Calendar chapbooks which appeared at the close of the eighteenth century, and a likely hyperbolic biography published in 1662, three years after her death, as well as, most usefully, a string of arrest records. Yet the woman herself is still somewhat of a mysterious figure. Perhaps the most important part about the legacy of Mary Frith in the history of women and women’s equality, isn’t where she got her nickname “Cut-purse”, but the fact that she turned her transgression of femininity into a performance. Was she transgender, a lesbian, a cross-dresser or just a woman trying to survive within a dangerous patriarchal society? Called a “roaring girl” by pamphleteers (early modern press), Mary Frith was a well-known thief on the streets of London, known for her years on the streets but also for her characteristic cross-dressing. Frith was born sometime in 1584, into a respectable working-class family, her father was a shoemaker. Several parts of her life remain unclear, enlightened only by a sensational biography published in 1662, three years after her death. Although some scholars have suggested that Frith herself may have participated in the authoring or research of this book, its legitimacy as an accurate narrative is mostly disbelieved. One thing we do know is that she had been troublesome ever since her youth and that efforts to reform her behaviour, for example, her uncle attempted to send her to New England, proved unsuccessful, she actually jumped overboard off the ship and swam back to shore. Understanding Frith from her childhood is perhaps too hopeful, we can gather from legitimate primary sources (legal and arresting reports) that Frith was on the streets from a young age, not because she explicitly needed to be, as with many other lower-class people in Elizabethan England, because she wanted to. This, and descriptions of her general attitude and demeanour indicate why Frith was long thought to be transgressive in her nature. She was not interested in the complexities of learning how to be a woman, she was ‘loud and boisterous’, had an inherent ‘abhorrence’ to children and crucially, is often described as ‘masculine’. In her criminal career, she often took to cross-dressing, the source of much of the controversy concerning her, this choice might have simply made her life easier, yet by the point of her early twenties she had turned her daily life into a performative event, itself a lucrative venture, and it is for cross-dressing, or rather, ‘public immorality” that she is arrested for on Christmas Day in 1611 and publicly humiliated for in January 1612 in front of a crowd of keen fans of “Moll Cutpurse”. But are these descriptions fair, do they accurately display a woman who might have actually been a transgender man or do they present a woman who was simply unhappy with the lot she was given? That’s a complex question that in reality, we can’t ever hope to answer. Yet, she almost exclusively dressed as a man throughout her adulthood, she engaged in masculine activities, and several arrest reports write with disgust about her swearing, drinking and smoking. But, there is no proof of anything which would further a transgender or even lesbian conclusion, bar perhaps an aversion to prostitution. So, what exactly makes this woman, firstly so popular, and secondly commit an act which arguably puts her life and her freedom at risk more than her actions of petty theft? Let’s consider the why first, as stated above, Frith would have had no real reason to sink into this life of crime in Southwark throughout her childhood. She and her family were lower class, yes, but that didn’t lower her chances of respectable employment. Many daughters throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were actually trained in their father’s profession, Frith would have likely had this opportunity herself, especially as there is no mention of brothers. Furthermore, lower-class women did in fact have a clear route for the development of careers in service. Teenage girls would regularly begin service as kitchen maids, or housemaids in the service of nobility, many others would be married by their early twenties, their husbands making enough in their own professions to allow the women to be housewives, as frith’s mother appears to be. Yet whilst still a teenager, Frith was arrested at least twice for petty theft, in 1600 and in 1602, indicating that she had no interest in traditional life. This simple fact makes her transgressive of seventeenth-century gender roles, but does it make her transgressive today? Not really, right? The options for women might have been secure but they weren’t exactly freedom, perhaps that freedom of choice was what Frith was searching for. But that doesn’t really explain the cross-dressing. If we think about crimes that women committed on the streets, I bet the first thing that comes to your mind is something like Nancy in Oliver Twist, she might be a thief but she is primarily a prostitute, inarguably a dangerous position, even if you weren’t in actuality soliciting you might still be attacked, assaulted or raped, or on the other hand, arrested for soliciting. So, the choice to parade in men’s clothing might have initially been a sort of protective and practical measure. Similarly, it would have initially given her a sense of anonymity, allowing her to thieve without recognition. This anonymity was a common thread among other women, who would dress as men to move through society with more ease, for some, this choice was unquestionably gendered, see those who dressed as or even lived as men to work, marry, or even serve in the military, Frith’s actions don’t appear to be driven by a rejection of gender, rather of gender roles, which were not singularly tied. Being a woman in early modern England was often a case of ornamentalism rather than practicality, Frith’s rejection of marriage, of children and of her prescribed gender role does not appear to be anything but a rejection of an arbitrary performance. This is argued based on a number of facts, firstly, her character remained female in her performance, secondly, she did live entirely as a woman in the later years of her life, thirdly, her home was inextricably feminine (although this doesn’t necessitate gender it does support an argument that her rejection of gender norms was performative only), finally, Mary Beard has described it most succinctly, there was “no template for what a powerful woman looks like, except for that she looks rather like a man”. Even Queen Elizabeth I avoided several restrictions and expectations of her gender throughout her reign. So, it is reasonable to assume that whilst Mary Frith actively transgressed her prescribed gender role, she was not necessarily driven by a sexual or gendered disparity. Finally, let's consider the impact of Mary Frith’s transvestitism. We know that Frith rejected the arbitrary and stifling restraints of her gender from her childhood on and her efforts to turn this cross-dressing into performance throughout her adult life was not only lucrative but also, unsurprisingly, divisive, we also know that her fans, for want of a better term were rather disappointed with the woman herself, most leaving out of boredom when she was stood in repentance at St Paul’s Cross in 1612, but did she impact other women in transgression or crime? Arguably yes, so much so that the authorities were specifically looking out for women dressed as men whilst ‘important’ men (read those who are institutionally misogynist) published transcripts and denouncements of these women. Frith wasn’t the first, and she wasn’t the last but she was certainly extremely influential. The true extent of Mary Frith’s transgressions of her prescribed gender will never be fully clear to us, but what we can conclude is that she was stifled within a patriarchal society, unhappy with the life she was supposed to have and decided, through criminality and drama, to create her own. A transgressor if ever that was one. Sources Kyte, Holly, Roaring Girls, (London: Harper Collins, 2019) 'Mary Frith, or Moll Cutpurse, the Roaring Girl', East End Women's Museum, (20/11/2016), < https://eastendwomensmuseum.org/blog/mary-frith >, [03/03/2023] 'DANGEROUS WOMEN: THE CROSS-DRESSING CAVALIER MARY FRITH', Historic Royal Palaces Blog, (28/02/2020), < https://blog.hrp.org.uk/curators/dangerous-women-the-cross-dressing-cavalier-mary-frith/>, [03/03/2023]

Someone you may not have any awareness of in this list of women and equality throughout history is British councillor Mavis Best. Best led a group of black women activists from Lewisham who successfully petitioned for the recall of 'Sus' Law, the colloquial term for section 4 of the 1824 Vagrancy Act, which allowed arrest based solely on suspicion of a crime. Police used this periodically to stop, search, arrest, detain and assault young black men. Whilst also a single mother Best’s leadership of the Scrap Sus campaign was singularly successful, and her personal involvement in protest unprecedented. She has received little awareness for her efforts however and remains largely in obscurity. Best moved from Jamaica to the UK in her early 20s in 1961, joining her brothers and sister in Peckham. Best was immediately aware of the restrictions placed against her, finding difficulties in employment opportunities, housing, policing and general hostility from the wider population. She would later tell an interviewer in a radio appearance that “We didn’t have the language to speak about racism in those days. That comes later. But we knew they didn’t like us. ” This awareness allowed for further enlightenment to ongoing Black Rights movements across the country, in the 1970s she studied community development at Goldsmiths College, where she met Basil Manning, who pushed for her involvement in the growing ‘Scrap Sus’ campaign, burgeoning in Lewisham. Best would go on to lead the fight for the repeal of this act whilst also raising her three children as a single mother. 'Sus' Law is a colloquial term for section 4 of the 1824 Vagrancy Act. This entitled the police to stop and search, and arrest anyone in a public space if there was suspicion that they intended to commit an offence. Although it was slightly more complex to bring such cases to trial, there was still a good chance that the arresting force could provide proof of suspicion. Within a fundamentally racist society, this law was typically and increasingly used against young black men in Metropolitan areas. Often young men and boys were simply looking into a shop window or walking down a street. The treatment they would then receive was something more reminiscent of 1930s Germany. They were detained for days, with no notice given to families, physically assaulted in police vans and stations, and later wrongly accused of criminal activities such as theft or conspiracy, only 10% of 'Sus' convictions had supplementary evidence to police testimony. It was the subject of protest among other causes in the 1980 and 1981 Race Riots around England before Best became involved and it is telling of the institutionalised racism in the British Police force that when questioned on the law in 1980, then Met commissioner Sir David McNee argued that there was such a high proportion of black people incarcerated thanks to the law because they were “over-represented in offences of robbery and other violent theft.” Best’s leadership of the “Scrap Sus” Campaign was arguably fundamental to its quick repeal once protests had begun, quickly enlisting co-campaigner Paul Boateng, Best is described to have been almost obsessive in the organisation of the campaign, immediately taking to leadership and organising protests in days and being so involved in them that she was often dragged away by the very police she was protesting; they produced leaflets, and flyers to hand out at public events, personally marshalled families and communities to attend hearings, drumming up support and witnesses for any and all cases she could, pushing the effort with her group that the only way to win was to directly challenge the authority, call them what they were, liars. Boateng described how she was singularly committed to the campaign, calling him “at all times of the day and night and on the weekends, and say: ‘X, Y or Z is happening. You need to get down here. And I did.” Perhaps the most notable action of Best and her ‘Scrap Sus’ Protestors was their direct challenge of arrests. Best herself would refuse to leave stations until arrested men were released into her care, explaining later that this step was necessary for her and the communities affected because “by then their parents were so debilitated by the whole thing that they couldn’t do anything.” 1981 is described as one of the worst years for British Race Relations: National Front Protests had closed and opened 1980 and 1981 on a sour note, this was followed in January with the New Cross House which Fire saw thirteen young black people die. Could the fire have been started thanks to an arson attack as part of the aforementioned fascist protests? The suspicion was ironically never addressed. Mass protests in the following months were met with indignant racism and violence and in April the violence arguably reached a climax with ‘Operation Swamp 81’ in Brixton. Operation Swamp, named for Thatcher’s statement that Britain was “swamped” with other cultures saw 1000 people stopped and 150 arrested, actions which saw an uprising in the following days and continual uneasiness and readiness to protest in the following months throughout all of London. Protesting lasted three years, with both Conservative and Labour Governments ignoring the community’s complaints and efforts until 1981 when a Home Affairs committee was eventually formed to address the issue. The law was repealed in August but most agreed it was too late to repair the damage that had already been done throughout the year. Mavis Best is not a single success story, she continued to fight for Black rights throughout her career over the following three decades, working for Camden Social Services, and working with several grassroots community projects in the 80s and 90s. Throughout it all, Best would lead the movements, speaking up when others couldn’t or were too afraid to. For example, Best pushed for support for young people from their local churches, worked with the Anti-Racist Alliance in the early 90s, and continued to campaign specifically for black individuals mistreated by the law, such as Stephen Lawrence and was part of a panel to review the implementation of the Macpherson Report, which had concluded that there was ‘institutionalised racism’ in the UK police forces. Additionally, she helped start and support two efforts to provide aid to African and African-Caribbean people: the Saturday Achievement Project and the Simba Family Project. Almost 20 years after her involvement with “Scrap Sus”, in 1998, Best was elected Labour Councillor in Greenwich, her long time colleague, Paul Boateng, this year had become a minister at the Home Office, and it was Boateng who appointed Best to the committee which oversaw community development trusts. In 2002 she established the Greenwich African Caribbean Organisation. Throughout the 00s her activism continued, setting up a commemoration for the black and enslaved people of Greenwich centred around a grace of an unknown Black Person, who saw that a ceremonial juneberry tree was planted at Charlton House to commemorate the black people of the borough, the house had been partially built on the proceeds of slavery. Furthermore, her activism wasn’t solely restricted to London; on a holiday to Jamaica, she became so enraptured with a local campaign concerning employment that she stayed to assist them for several months. Unfortunately, acknowledging the problem does not entirely solve it and institutionalised racism is arguably as prevalent in today’s society as it was in the 1970s, it’s just got to be more creative in its discrimination. Still, Best’s contribution, and that of the women she led and inspired throughout her activism and political career shouldn’t have faded into obscurity as it has, it was her leadership and fearlessness which helped bring about the end of a brutal and devastating technicality of the law, and it is with her continued legacy that we can work to address ongoing racism in our society. Source Rose, Steve, ‘“She was not a woman to back down@: the fearless Black campaigner who helped to scrap the UK’s ‘sus’ law’, The Guardian, (02/12/2022), < https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/nov/29/she-was-not-a-woman-to-back-down-the-fearless-black-campaigner-who-helped-to-scrap-the-sus-law >, [03/03/2023] ‘Best, Mavis’, Hackney Museum, < https://museum-collection.hackney.gov.uk/names/AUTH4748 >, [03/03/2023] Maggs, Joseph, ‘Fighting Sus: then and now’ Race Relations, (04/04/2019), < https://irr.org.uk/article/fighting-sus-then-and-now/ >, [03/03/2023]

In 1869, Sophia Jex Blake arrived in historic Edinburgh on a heartfelt mission. She wanted to study medicine at Edinburgh University and achieve a degree, allowing her to work as a medical doctor. At this time, there was not one British University willing to train women as doctors. There were eight big British universities: four in Scotland and four in England and although women were beginning to be allowed onto arts courses, Medical Faculties were closed to them. In the United States and European university cities such as Paris, Zurich and Bologna, women were being welcomed into medical faculties in good numbers. Britain was lagging behind shamefully. Sophia, a bold and determined character, from a wealthy London family, was always an excellent networker and general charmer. She seemed to understand public relations and strategy in a thoroughly modern way. In Edinburgh, she worked the salons of Edinburgh Society and drew courage from a number of progressive men willing to back her in her campaign. (There were many women backing her too, but they were not in positions of power to enable her to progress). While some high-profile medical men were liberal and progressive, of the enlightened sort, plenty were misogynistic, patriarchal and Calvinistic in their ways, much preferring women in the home, or as it was known, the domestic sphere. The early days of the female suffrage saw rallies and campaigns brewing, but women involved were accused of being ‘unnatural’ ‘prostitutes’ and ‘men in skirts’. At first Edinburgh said yes to Sophia. Hurrah! But this quickly turned to a no: Boo! A vote in another governing body of the university had gone against Sophia, much to her disappointment. It was thought that the efforts for accommodating one woman would be unfeasible. For example, for reasons of decency, it was apparently essential to teach women separately and alter the course for their delicate ways. To this, Sophia said: ‘I will find more women to make this worthwhile!” And she did. By advertising in the Scotsman newspaper for more women to join her on the course at Edinburgh. The editor of the Scotsman, Alexander Russel became a great champion of the Edinburgh Seven. So much so that he married one of them – Helen Evans! Six women replied to Sophia’s advert, and Edinburgh agreed to have them on special terms from the autumn of 1869. Sir James Young Simpson, Charles Darwin, Robert Louis Stevenson and Queen Victoria’s daughters supported the women. But there were seriously aggrieved opposers too – Sir Robert Christison and Sir Joseph Lister. Christison was a respected toxicologist, pathologist and physician to the Queen. He had given compelling evidence at the trial of graverobbers, Burke and Hare. His views on women in medicine were extreme. He didn’t mind female nurses and midwives. But he thought women’s brains were too small to be medics. (It’s since been discovered that Einstein had a small brain, and it is the pathways of the brain that matter more than overall size). Christison also thought women were too fragile to cope with the gory and upsetting side of medicine. Which is ironic because women had been delivering babies and tending to battlefield wounds since time began. Two of the most potentially gruesome aspects to medical care – obstetrics and war injuries – were already proven areas of expertise for women. So, what was the real problem? Why were the misogynists so vehemently opposed? To understand this, and how the campaign against the women grew violent, unyielding and embittered, we have to follow the stages of dissent. It was never going to be easy, trialing women on the esteemed medical course for the first time, but the extent of the battle to oust them could never have been anticipated. The first few months on the course went quite smoothly for Sophia and her female colleagues. The women worked diligently, and some sympathetic professors taught them independently of the main course, while they also helped each other to learn at their shared Georgian townhouse in Buccleuch Place, Edinburgh. The first big exams loomed in April 1870, and something controversial happened at this point. Edith Pechey, one of the Edinburgh Seven, achieved the top mark in the Chemistry exam. (Isobel came top in Anatomy and the women were generally in the top 4 out of around 200 students). The person who gained the top mark in Chemistry was routinely awarded the Hope Scholarship, laid down by Professor Hope forty years before. But Professor Crum Brown, advised by Professor Robert Christison decided that the award should go to the second top student – a man. So, Edith was denied the prize. At this moment, Sophia and the others began to understand what a momentous task lay ahead. Would they ever be allowed to graduate and become doctors? After the Hope Scandal, things went downhill. The women were jeered and laughed at, blocked out of lectures and exams, and death threats were sent to their home. At times, the Edinburgh Seven required a bodyguard to get around the city and some kindly Irish students protected them. This dissent reached a peak in November 1870, when the women arrived at the daunting Surgeon’s Hall building in the Old Town of Edinburgh, to take an Anatomy exam. In the dusk of a late Autumn afternoon, they saw that a large gathering had formed, with the purpose of blocking them from entering the exam hall. The subtext was that if they did not gather certificates from exams successfully taken, then they could be denied the right to graduate. This was now the aim of the opposers – to keep them women as hobbyists instead of rival professionals. The riot was an ugly scene – drunken singing, pelting of the women, name calling and violence. All carried out by middle class, educated students, possibly backed by senior professors and aided by ‘street rowdies’. One journalist of the time noted that: ‘In an age when chivalry towards women is the social norm, these men should be ashamed of themselves.’ Were the women daunted? Did they flee the violent scene? No. They linked arms and stood firm. After an hour of noisy demonstrating, a janitor eventually let them into the exam hall, where they calmly took the paper and passed. You might think the University opposers would feel shame at this point and accept them women were here to stay? The opposite happened. The men who wanted to the women to leave doubled their efforts and dug in. They were looking for a way to oust the women for good and in January of 1871, Professor Christison thought he’d found a way. It was at a meeting of the board of the Infirmary that Sophia spoke up during a debate. She said that the way the Seven had been treated was appalling, especially in the riot. She went on the say that the riot had been started by Professor Christison’s assistant, Edward Cunningham Craig, and that he was drunk and used foul language. This was taken as defamation of character and Sophia was served a writ and taken to court in June 1871. Public opinion after the riot and with regard to the court case was very much with Sophia and the other women. However, the all-male jury in the court of session decided Sophia had defamed the character of Cunningham Craig and she was the loser. That said, he was only awarded a penny, which was a way of saying what they really thought about his behaviour. From then on, Sophia Jex Blake was an international star – a celebrity activist - and she very cleverly turned her thoughts to a London Campaign to change the law through an Act of Parliament at Westminster. Edinburgh became more and more awkward and were determined that women would not get the degree level on the course, so the women began to leave Edinburgh to qualify in Bern and Dublin. Sophia formed a training hospital for women in London along with Elizabeth Garrett Anderson. In 1876, the law changed so that women doctors should be given equal rights as men, and in 1878, Sophia Jex Blake returned to Edinburgh as Scotland’s first woman doctor. She worked in Edinburgh until her retirement. The other members of the Edinburgh Seven also spent their life devoted to girls’ education, medical training for women and medical care for women. Sophia Jex Blake, we salute you. You can buy Janey's book The Edinburgh Seven: the first women to study medicine here

Militant suffragette might not be a term you’d immediately associate with a disabled teacher, but militant suffragette is an accurate description for the largely overlooked Rosa May Billinghurst, or as she was to the people who knew her, May. Billinghurst was born in Lewisham in London in 1875, at a time when women’s rights movements were growing globally. In New Zealand, all women over 21 were enfranchised in 1891, and in South Australia women received the same, as well as the right to stand for parliament in 1895. In the USA, campaigners were fighting for enfranchisement alongside black citizens, across the pond, in the UK, working-class movements for enfranchisement had been ongoing since the 1830s, women, still unable to vote even if they were landowners, were uniting to form organisations to push for the equal right to vote. Political support was unsteady, in 1869, John Stuart Mill published an essay in support of enfranchising women, after winning election on a platform which had advocated for votes for women. Also in the 1860s, Mill presented a petition to Parliament which would allow women the vote, an act drafted by early women’s rights group The Kensington Society and signed by the likes of Florence Nightingale and Mary Somerville. However, by the time of Billinghurst’s birth and childhood, women were no closer to achieving the vote than they had been 20 years prior. The Women’s Suffrage Committee was formed in Manchester in 1867, with meetings attended by a young Emmeline Pankhurst. In 1897 the committee joined with the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies. But the women’s suffrage movement took off as Rosa May Billinghurst would have been able to engage with the movement herself, with Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughter Christabel breaking off from the central suffrage movement to create the organisation which earned its members the name suffragette, The Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU). To return to our protagonist: Billinghurst had suffered polio as a child, becoming paralyzed from the waist down. Her disability does not appear to have been much of a hindrance to her activism, but rather a simple fact of her existence. As a teen she became actively engaged with the Women’s Liberal Association, seemingly joining the WSPU in 1907, marking a move from any peaceful engagement to the militant actions recognisable of the movement. Billinghurst’s exact actions in protests and activism are annoyingly, often unclear. We do know that she was a very active participant involved in marches and protests following elections. Billinghurst also founded the Greenwich branch of the WSPU in 1910, acting as its first secretary and naturally taking part in its demonstrations. Regarding accessibility, she was slated to be in a wheelchair-like device, effectively a tricycle and became well known among the press as the “cripple suffragette”. Such was the militant activism that on the Greenwich branch’s first march she was arrested after being thrown out of her chair by police (although she was allegedly happy with the publicity). Police also targeted her by stranding her in her chair in an alleyway with flat tyres, even stealing the valves. Billinghurst would go on to use her tricycle/wheelchair in further protests, hiding rocks, pamphlets and ribbons under her skirts and blankets. Her disability also worked in her favour when she was arrested and sent to Holloway prison (the first time) for breaking a window. She had been sentenced to hard labour, but her disability confused guards so much that they didn’t actually assign her any work to do! However, she was not safe from the curse of all militant suffragettes. In 1913, sent to Holloway, this time for damaging letters in a postbox, Billinghurst went on hunger strike and was consequently force-fed via nasal tube for two weeks, this ripped her nostril and broke her tooth, leading to her being released after only two weeks. In case you needed another example of the deplorable British police force in the early twentieth century, during protests to petition the king in May 1914 Billinghurst had like her peers, chained herself and her wheelchair to the gates of Buckingham Palace, the reaction of the police was to tip her out of her chair, leaving her stranded. The Representation of the People Act was published in 1918 by a Government who had had to acknowledge the value of women throughout the Great War. Perhaps the passing of the Act was also a form of gratitude for the militant actions of the WSPU and suffragettes like Billinghurst putting their political freedom aside during the war. The act only enfranchised women to vote in national elections when aged 30 and over, so it wasn’t exactly successful, but it was a start. Billinghurst retired from activism at the passing of the bill and died in July 1953. Sources: ‘Remembering the Suffragettes: Rosa May Billinghurst (1875-1953)’, LSE Blog, (2022), < https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsehistory/2022/03/23/rosa-may-billinghurst-31-may-1875-29-july-1953/ >, [26/02/2023] ‘Who were the Suffragettes?’, Museum of London, < https://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/museum-london/explore/who-were-suffragettes#:~:text=The%20Suffragettes%20were%20part%20of,in%20parliamentary%20and%20general%20elections .>, [26/02/2023] (Youtube video) Kellgren-Fozard, Jessica, ‘“The Crippled Suffragette”//Rosa May Billighurst’, in Historical Profiles, Jessica Kellgren-Fozard, (2021), < https://youtu.be/9RuL6Y6BcGs > [26/02/2023] Hanlon, Sheila, ‘Rosa May Billinghurst: Suffragette on Three Wheels’, Sheila Hanlon, < http://www.sheilahanlon.com/?page_id=1314 >, [26/02/2023] “Billinghurst Letters” and “Alice Ker Letters,” The Women’s Library, Autograph Collection, Vol XXIX, 9/29, 1912-1913 Abrams, Fran Freedom’s Cause: Lives of the Suffragettes , (London: Profile Books, 2003) Dove, Iris, Yours in the Cause: Suffragettes in Lewisham, Greenwhich and Woolwhich , (1988)