Significant Sisters

by Margaret Forster

  31.Ibid.

  32.Ibid. p. 83.

  33.Sahli p. 80.

  34.Ibid. p. 83.

  35.Ibid. p. 83.

  36.Ibid. p. 87.

  37.Ibid. p. 111.

  38.Pioneer Work etc. p. 197.

  39.Sahlip. 123.

  40.Kitty Barry’s Reminiscences (photostat of microfilm LC).

  41.Pioneer Work etc. p. 198.

  42.K.B.’s Reminiscences. For Kitty’s place in rest of Blackwell family and her relationship with Elizabeth see Sahli, Chapters IV, V and VI.

  43.Sahli p. 202. The baby became Sir Henry Paul Harvey, British diplomat and editor of the Oxford Companion to English Literature. He arrived at the Blackwell home in 1870 when his parents went abroad.

  44.Letter to Mme Bodichon in Fawcett Library, City of London Polytechnic.

  45.Ibid.

  46.Ibid.

  47.Ibid.

  48.Sahli p. 168.

  49.Ibid. p. 200.

  50.Ibid. pp. 247–8.

  51.Ibid. p. 90.

  52.Ibid. p. 288.

  53.Ibid. p. 448.

  54.Address given at opening of winter session of London School of Medicine for Women, London 1889.

  55.These are figures for the United Kingdom provided by the General Medical Council from the Register of Medical Practitioners. In the USA 4,970 female students entered medical colleges out of a total of 17,204, which was 28.9% (figures from Professional Women and Minorities – A Manpower Data Resource Service, Scientific Manpower Commission, 4th edition, 1983).

  Consultancies do not exist in the USA but 10.1% of physicians were female in 1980–81. Interestingly, Pediatrics (27%) was the leading specialist field for women but Obstetrics was well down (11.4%).

  56.Letter to Lady Byron, April 1851 (in Wellcome Institute).

  Employment – Florence Nightingale 1820–1910

  1.Miss Nightingale to Mme Mohl, April 1868 (quoted p. 477 Florence Nightingale by Cecil Woodham-Smith, Constable 1950).

  2.FN to Sir John McNeill, Feb. 7, 1865 (Nightingale Papers Vol. LIII BM).

  3.FN to Harriet Martineau, Nov. 30, ’58 (Nightingale Papers Vol. I. Add. MS 45, 788 BM).

  4.FN to J. S. Mill, Aug. 11, 1867 (Add. MS 39, 927 BM).

  5.Ibid.

  6.Ibid.

  7.Appendix to Notes on Nursing: What it is and What it is not by FN (1860).

  8.FN to Mme Mohl, Dec. 13, 1861 (quoted C. W-Smith p. 385).

  9.Ibid.

  10.Cassandra: Vol. II Suggestionsfor Thought to Searchers after Religious Truth among the Artizans of England (3 Vols privately printed 1860). Also printed as Appendix in The Cause by Ray Strachey (Virago 1979) – this version used – p. 399.

  11.Ibid. p. 400.

  12.Ibid. p. 403.

  13.Ibid. p. 416.

  14.Ibid. p. 409.

  15.FN – Private Note 1842 (Nightingale Papers – hereafter NP).

  16.Reminiscences – Julia Ward Howe (1819–99), (pub. Houghton, Mifflin & Co., NY 1900).

  17.C. Woodham-Smith p. 76.

  18.FN – Private Note 1842 (NP). I share Cecil Woodham-Smith’s interpretation of the reason why FN’s handwriting varies so remarkably both in formation of the words (wavering to very strong) and the pressure applied to the pencil. Nobody could doubt the extreme agitation of the writer.

  19.Ibid.

  20.Ibid.

  21.Cecil Woodham-Smith: Florence Nightingale – quoted in letter 1897 p. 91.

  22.FN to mother Oct. 8, 1850 (NP Vol. LII. Add. MS 45790).

  23.Oct. 25, 31 (ibid).

  24.FN to mother July 16, 1851 (ibid).

  25.Ibid.

  26.Ibid.

  27.Ibid.

  28.FN to mother Aug. 31, 1851 (ibid).

  29.Ibid.

  30.Private Note 1851 (quoted CW-S p. 93).

  31.FN to father Aug. 13, 1853 (quoted CW-S p. 116).

  32.FN to father Dec. 3, 1853 (ibid p. 121).

  33.FN to Sidney Herbert Jan. 4, 1855 (quoted CW-S p. 176).

  34.FN to Dr Bowman Nov. 14, 1854 (quoted E. Cook – The Life of Florence Nightingale Vol. I p. 185).

  35.FN to Sidney Herbert Feb. 1855 (quoted CW-S p. 209).

  36.FN to Hilary Bonham Carter Nov. 24, 1871 (Joyce Prince unpublished PhD thesis Univ. of London (1982) “Florence Nightingale’s Reform of Nursing 1860–1887”).

  37.Ibid.

  38.Ibid.

  39.Miss Florence Nightingale’s Addresses to Probationer Nurses (1872–1900).

  40.Ibid. (for 1873).

  41.Ibid.

  42.FN to mother March 7, 1862 (NP Vol. LII BM. Add. MS 45, 790). Sir James Paget was surgeon to Queen Victoria.

  43.FN to mother Feb. 23, 1863 (ibid).

  44.FN 1889 (quoted CW-S p. 577).

  45.Ibid.

  46.FN to mother March 1862 (NP Vol. LII BM. Add. MS 45, 780).

  47.Parthe to Mrs Gaskell Aug. 4, 1862 (NP Vol. LVIII BM. Add. MS 45, 796).

  48.FN to Fred (?) April 1896 (NP Vol. LVIII. Add. MS 45, 791).

  49.FN to father March 19, 1868 (NP Vol. LII BM. Add. MS 45, 790).

  50.FN to father Nov. 4, 1850 (ibid).

  51.FN to father Oct. 12, 1867 (ibid).

  52.FN to Aunt Mai (quoted CW-S p. 562)

  53.Notes on Register 1892 in NP Vol. LIII.

  54.FN to father April 22, 1861 (NP Vol. LII BM. Add. MS 45, 790).

  55.FN to Louis Shore Oct. 1897 (quoted CW-S p. 588).

  56.Memoir of Caroline Fox (NP LVIII Add. MS 45, 796).

  57.FN to Mme Mohl June 1857 (quoted CW-S p. 288).

  58.FN to father April 22 1861 (NP Vol. LII Add. 45, 790).

  59.FN to Cardinal Manning 1852 (NP Vol. LVIII Add. MS 45, 796).

  60.FN to Mary Jones 1867 (quoted in A History of the Nursing Profession Brian Abel-Smith, Heinemann 1960 p. 25).

  61.FN 1892 (quoted in “Mrs Bedford-Fenwick and the Rise of Professional Nursing” by Winifred Hector, Royal College of Nursing 1973) Intro. p. ix.

  62.The total number of nurses (male and female) on the UKCC Register was 817, 243 on 30th March 1981, of which 13,838 were male. (Figures from UK Central Council for Nursing, Midwifery and Health Nursing.)

  63.FN to Harriet Martineau Feb. 8 1860 (NP Vol. L. Add. MS 45, 788).

  64.1899 (quoted Hector – Intro. p. ix).

  Education – Emily Davies 1830–1921

  1.Life of Frances Power Cobbe. As Told by Herself (1904).

  2.Schools Inquiry Commission 1867–8 (Vol. VII – 13 – Pt VI – Mr C. H. Stanton’s report on Counties of Devon and Somerset).

  3.Ibid. Mr H. A. Giffard’s report on Surrey and Sussex.

  4. Ibid.

  5.Ibid. Mr D. R. Fearon, Metropolitan District.

  6. Ibid.

  7.Ibid. Appendix on submitted documents on educational background (No. 23).

  8.Emily Davies and Girton College by Barbara Stephen (pub. Constable 1927) p. 25.

  9.“Family Chronicle” – ED’s handwritten memoir – Girton College Library.

  10.“Family Chronicle”.

  11.“Family Chronicle”. (The chronicle breaks off in the middle of the story of William’s disgrace and is not resumed for 100 pages. Girton College has made every effort to trace this missing section but has failed. Barbara Stephen’s biography which was heavily based on the chronicle makes no mention of what happened to William.)

  12.“Family Chronicle”.

  13. Ibid.

  14.Report on the Northumberland and Durham Branch of the Society for Promoting the Employment of Women 1861. (Reprinted in Thoughts on Some Questions Relating to Women.)

  15.“Family Chronicle”.

  16.Stephen p. 71 (letter to Jane Crow Jan. 1864).

  17.“Family Chronicle”.

  18.In America the first endowed institution for the education of girls was the Troy Female Seminary opened by Emma Willard in 1821. The first free school for girls open
ed in Worcester (Mass.) in 1824. Thomas Woody (A History of Women’s Education in the USA, NY Science Press, 1929) traces the development of women’s education in all its aspects.

  19.Stephen p. 73.

  20.Stephen p. 83 (letter quoted ED to Miss Richardson).

  21.The Influence of University Degrees on the Education of Women (Victoria Magazine, 1863).

  22.Feminists and Bureaucrats Sheila Fletcher (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1974).

  23. Ibid.

  24.Stephen p. 100 (quotes letter ED to Mr Tomkinson).

  25.“Family Chronicle” Jan. 1868, Emily Davies wrote “By and by, when the colleges at Oxford and Cambridge are open to women, we will open ours to men.”

  26.Stephen p. 103 (quotes Mr Hutton to ED).

  27.Frances Mary Buss by Annie E. Ridley.

  28.Stephen p. 149 (quotes ED to Miss Richardson, Oct. 1866).

  29.Ibid. p. 189.

  30. Ibid.

  31.Ibid. p. 194.

  32.Ibid. p. 168.

  33.Ibid. p. 169 (ED to Mme Bodichon, March 1868).

  34.Ibid. p. 208 (ED to Mme Bodichon, March 1869).

  35.Ibid. p. 219.

  36.That Infidel Place – Short History of Girton 1869–1969, Bradbrooke (quotes Mrs Townshend).

  37.Stephen p. 220 (ED to Anna Richardson, Oct. 20 1869).

  38.Ibid. p. 224 (account given by Miss Dove).

  39.Ibid. (account given by Miss Maynard).

  40.Ibid. p. 221 (Miss L. I. Lumsden, Girton Review, 1907).

  41.Ibid. p. 232 (Lumsden on ED).

  42.Ibid. p. 239 (ED to Anna Richardson from the Examination Room, Dec. 1870).

  43.Ibid. p. 262 (ED to AR Jan. 1872).

  44.Ibid. p. 295 (ED to Mme Bodichon).

  45.Ibid. p. 276.

  46.Ibid.

  47.Ibid. p. 278 (ED to Mr Tomkinson).

  48.Ibid. p. 302 (ED to Mme Bodichon).

  49.Ibid. p. 303.

  50.Ibid. p. 304 (ED to Miss Manning).

  51.Stephen p. 355.

  52.That Infidel Place Bradbrooke.

  53.Josephine Butler to Albert Rutson May 28, 1868 (JB Fawcett Library). (Josephine Butler had just become president of the North of England Council for Promoting the Higher Education of Women when ED formed a committee Girton in 1867. She later resigned to concentrate on fighting the Contagious Diseases Acts.)

  54.Stephen p. 132.

  55.Ibid. p. 293.

  56.“Family Chronicle” (1864).

  57.Stephen p. 109 (ED to Mr Tomkinson Nov. 1865).

  58.Ibid. p. 249 (ED to A. Richardson).

  59.Ibid. p. 108.

  60.Ibid. p. 112.

  61.“Family Chronicle”.

  62.The figures for 1981 for university entrance show that 34,613 girls registered compared with 52,214 boys (CSO Annual Abstract of Statistics 1983). Ten years earlier there were 21,199 girls as opposed to 44,618 boys. In America, there is no exact equivalent of British university entrance, but in 1980 the percentage of women in full-time higher education was 49.9% of the total.

  Sexual Morality – Josephine Butler 1828–1906

  1.Introduction to Personal Reminiscences of a Great Crusade by Josephine Butler (pub. Horace Marshall, 1896).

  2.Ibid. p. 42.

  3.Memoir of John Grey of Dilston (Edmonston & Douglas, 1869).

  4.JB Feb. 17, 1868 Fawcett Library Josephine Butler Collection (hereafter FL).

  5.JB Jan. 1894 (FL).

  6.The Hour Before the Dawn by Josephine Butler (Trübner, 1876) p. 96.

  7.JB Feb. 18, 1890 (FL).

  8.Recollections of George Butler by Josephine Butler (Arrowsmith, 1892) p. 64.

  9.Ibid. p. 232.

  10.JB to father 1853 (FL).

  11.Recollections etc. p. 94.

  12.Ibid. p. 90.

  13.Ibid. p. 155.

  14.Arthur Butler Jan. 4, 1907 (FL).

  15.JB to Stanley, June 3, 1891 (FL).

  16.Recollections etc. JB’s diary for Oct. 30, 1864 p. 159.

  17.JB to Miss Priestman Jan. 24, 1873 (FL).

  18.Recollections etc. p. 182.

  19.Ibid.

  20.Ibid. p. 183.

  21.JB (1867 FL). The reference to Dr Moore is contained in the Notebook of Edith Leupold (daughter of JB’s eldest sister).

  22.Poem in JB collection filed with notebook above.

  23.In spite of their unanimity on the necessity of employment opportunities keeping pace with education for girls Josephine Butler and Emily Davies did not get on well. JB was President of the North of England Council for the Promotion of Higher Education for Girls when Emily Davies set up a committee to found Girton and was seen by ED as a dangerous rival offering, in the Ladies Lectures scheme, a “lesser” alternative which would harm her own aims. (See E. Davies chapter.)

  24.GB to JB Dec. 3, 1867. (There are many such instances, of George looking after the children, in the JB papers.)

  25.JB May 22, 1868 (FL).

  26.Ibid.

  27.JB to mother-in-law Feb. 1869 (FL).

  28.Recollections etc. p. 218.

  29.Ibid.

  30.Quoted in a letter from JB to an MP in Flame of Fire by E. Moberley Bell (Constable 1862).

  31.History of Woman Suffrage (see E. Cady Stanton chapter) Vol. 3 appendix – EC-S’s reminiscences of a visit to England in 1882.

  32.Personal Reminiscences etc. p. 27.

  33.Ibid. p. 48.

  34.The Harriet Hicks case is described by J. and D. Walkowitz in Clio’s Consciousness Raised – New Perspectives on the History of Women ed. Mary Hartman and Lois Bamer (Harper Colophon Bks).

  35.JB to Miss Priestman Jan. 24, 1873 (FL).

  36.JB to Mr Wilson Feb. 26, 1873 (FL).

  37.JB to Mr Wilson April 1, 1873 (FL).

  38.JB to Miss Priestman July 4, 1874 (FL).

  39.Ibid. Sept. 20, 1874 (FL).

  40.Recollections etc. p. 237.

  41.Ibid. diary for Aug. 14, 1876 p. 303.

  42.JB to Mr Martineau May 27, 1873 (FL).

  43.JB Feb. 17, 1883 (FL).

  44.Account of repeal in JB’s letter to sister Harriet, April 1883 (quoted in A Singular Iniquity by Glen Petrie pub. Macmillan 1971 p. 208).

  45.Recollections etc. p. 225.

  46.JB to Eliza (her eldest sister) July 12, 1885 (FL).

  47.JB to Stanley April 1891 (FL).

  48.Rebecca Jarrett by Josephine Butler (Morgan & Scott, 1886).

  49.Ibid.

  50.Ibid.

  51.Ibid.

  52.Ibid.

  53.Quoted in Josephine Butler, a Life Study by W. H. Stead (Morgan & Scott, 1887).

  54.JB to Stanley Oct. 1, 1886 (quoted in Petrie p. 266).

  55.JB to G. W. Johnson Feb. 18, 1891 (quoted in Petrie p. 266).

  56.JB to ?Jan 17, 1883 (FL).

  57.JB to Stanley June 3, 1891 (FL).

  58.JB to Stanley Dec. 23, 1901 (FL).

  59.JB to Stanley transcribed by Mr Burfoot after the new Liberal administration had taken office in 1906 (FL).

  60.(FL the last letter).

  61.Quoted in Facts are Stubborn Things; a Selection of Cases Illustrative of the Working of the Contagious Diseases Acts by Alfred Dyer (a contemporary of JB’s).

  62.Quoted in Josephine Butler: Flame of Fire by E. Moberley Bell.

  63.JB to Mr Wilson June 14, 1873 (FL).

  64.JB to Mrs Wilson Nov. 18, 1873 (FL). It has been stated that Josephine Butler had “absolutely no interest whatever in the question of female suffrage” (Petrie p. 63). This is utterly untrue. Over and over again in her letters Josephine Butler stresses the need for suffrage.

  65.JB to B. Jowett 1860 (FL).

  66.JB to Miss Priestman April 28, 1883 (FL). I have been unable to find “massinian” in any dictionary although its meaning is easy enough to guess in this context.

  Politics – Elizabeth Cady Stanton 1815–1902

  1.From “T
he Solitude of Self”, a speech made by ECS in 1892 (printed also in Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony – Correspondence, writings & speeches ed. Ellen Carol Dubois (Schocken Books, NY). ECS thought it was the best she ever made.

  2.Lydia Maria Child Letters p. 74 (quoted in Century of Struggle – the Woman’s Rights Movement in the United States by Eleanor Flexnor p. 62. This is the best book for the background to woman’s rights in America and immensely readable).

  3.Elizabeth Cady Stanton as Revealed in her Letters, Diaries and Reminiscences edited by Theodore Stanton and Harriot Stanton Blatch Vol. 1, p. 3. This is the main source for all information on ECS’s early life and all quotes come from it unless otherwise stated. Hereafter Stanton & Blatch (S & B).

  4.Diary Sept. 6, 1883 (Stanton & Blatch Vol. 2 p. 210).

  5.Quoted in Created Equal: Elizabeth Cady Stanton by Alma Lutz.

  6.Henry Stanton to ECS (photostat of letter dated only “Tues. 5 pm” in manuscript collection of ECS papers in Library of Congress).

  7.ECS to Rebecca R. Eyster, Stanton & Blatch Vol. 2 p. 15.

  8.Stanton & Blatch Vol. 1 p. 93.

  9.Stanton & Blatch Vol. 1 p. 79.

  10.Lutz.

  11.ECS to Elizabeth Pease 1840 (Lutz).

  12.ECS to Lucretia Mott 1841 (Lutz).

  13.Stanton & Blatch Vol. 1 p. 109.

  14.Ibid.

  15.Stanton & Blatch Vol. I p. 133.

  16.Ibid. p. 134.

  17.Ibid.

  18.Ibid. p. 141.

  19.Ibid. p. 143.

  20.Henry Stanton to ECS June 1843 (photostat from manuscript div. Library of Congress).

  21.HS to ECS 1843 (photostat L of C).

  22.HS to ECS 1843 (photostat L of C).

  23.HS to ECS 1843 (ibid). All three of these photostated manuscript letters bear only the year in Henry’s writing and the day of the week but not the month or date.

  24.Ibid.

  25.Stanton & Blatch Vol. 1 p. 144.

  26.ECS to Susan B. Anthony, June 10, 1856 (S & B Vol. II p. 67).

  27.History of Woman Suffrage (ed. ECS, Susan B. Anthony, Matilda Gage).

  28.ECS. Address delivered at Seneca Falls July 19 1848 (printed in Dubois).

  29.H of WS Vol. 1 (In her autobiography ECS also said “If I had had the slightest premonition of all that was to follow that convention I fear I should not have had the courage to risk it . . .”).

  30.H of WS Vol. 1.

  31.Between 1839 and 1850 most states in America passed some kind of legislation giving married women property rights. This swift movement for legislative reform contrasted with the slowness of England to follow suit. After J. S. Mill’s great suffrage speech of 1867 drew attention to women’s property disabilities, bills were introduced in 1868, 1869 and 1870 (for the agitation that preceded them see chap. 1 Caroline Norton) but it was not until 1882 that the Married Women’s Property Bill finally secured to married women not just property they had at marriage but property and earnings acquired after.