Spitfire Women

In various countries around the world March is Women’s History Month and it seems more important than ever for young women in particular to learn about the struggles and challenges that beset earlier generations in order to achieve rights for women. The right to vote and equal pay are standard now in most Westernised societies, but even there, there are still many careers and professions where women remain in a minority or are unrepresented.

On Australian ABC television this week, this report on the Royal Australian Air Force's need to find women fighter pilots indicates one area where women have yet to break the gender (if not sound) barrier.

If women during World War II proved themselves capable of flying Spitfires, Hurricanes and Lancaster bombers in often harrowing situations, one would have thought by 2011 it would have become normal to have them flying modern fighter jets. 

The BBC documentary "Spitfire Women" should be compulsory viewing for any young women interested in flying as a career.
There is also a recent book on the subject by Giles Whittell, "Spitfire Women of World War II". 
What an inspiring group they were.

And what is astonishing - and a little frustrating - is that it has taken more than half-a-century for the contribution of these women to become better-known but it also proves that women in all fields of endeavour still have a long haul ahead in making their history as valid as anything their male counterparts achieve.

Here are some links relating to Women's History Month.

Women's History Network (UK)
Women's History Forum (Australia)
National Women's History Project (US)

And for anyone interested in reading unusual and interesting stories from women's history at any time of the year, the magazine Herstoria is excellent and highly recommended. If not available in stores where you live, you can subscribe online and save trees!


  

They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters ...

While studying some transcripts of parish registers in connection with family history research, I came across several interesting entries for the parish of Ancroft, North Durham (the area of Northumberland near to Berwick-upon-Tweed).
The curate, William Hewitt, has carefully inscribed several burials for November of 1834 for unnamed individuals whom he has simply described as "A Shipwrecked Seaman from the ship Christiana of Stockholm lost at Spittal."
There were five of them in all, their estimated ages between 19 and 50, buried between 10th and 18th November, their bodies being found in various places along the Northumbrian coast south of Berwick and as far as Holy Island.
Curious to find out more about this tragedy, I tracked down a report in the Edinburgh newspaper, The Caledonian Mercury, of 15th November 1834, which reads as follows:

Spittall: Nov. 10 - Yesterday about three o'clock P.M. the wind blowing hard from the N.E. and a heavy sea, a vessel was seen about three miles south of the pier, apparently anxious to make the port of Berwick. About ten minutes after four o'clock she made the bay with her sides to the wind, when she was struck by a heavy sea, and before she had time to right, she was again struck by another sea, which completely capsized her, and all on board perished. A part of the crew (five in number) were seen on the side of the vessel, sixteen minutes after she capsized: but there being no life-boat in the place, no relief could be afforded by the hundreds who witnessed the catastrophe. The vessel sunk about half-past four, within speaking of the shore. A part of the wreck was washed onshore on the Scremerston Rock, during the night. The body of only one of the crew has yet been found - a young man about 18 years of age, lashed to the rigging. All that is yet known of the vessel is that she was the Christiana of Stockholm, laden with tar, timber and bones, for the port of Berwick. From the circumstances of children's clothes being washed onshore, it is supposed that the captain's family was on board.

The report of children's clothes is doubly poignant, for if there were any on board their bodies were presumably never found and they are not among those interred at Ancroft. One can only wonder at those families in Sweden, or wherever the sailors came from, anxiously waiting for loved ones who never came home. Even if they eventually had word on the loss of the Christiana, to know that people just stood by helplessly and there was no-one on hand to help them while so close to the shore just increases the tragedy.

But the story of the "business" of the sea and its hazards are as old as time itelf.  In nearly every Shipping Intelligence page of The Caledonian Mercury one can find reports in the same vein.  Despite the invention of the life-boat by William Wouldhave and associates in the late 1700s and the establishment of the first national lifeboat institution by Sir William Hillary in 1826, there were still not enough lifeboats available to go to the rescue for many years.

At the time the Christiana sank it is obvious that there wasn't one operational in this area of Berwick-upon- Tweed on that fateful November day in 1834. But from further research, it seems that the population were distressed enough to make sure something was done.

On the website for the Berwick Lifeboat station there is a history that is worth reading, and although the Christiana herself is not mentioned, it could be that her wreck was a major impetus in the townsfolk raising money by themselves for a station that was established the following year in 1835 with its operation later taken over by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution.

Women involved in life-saving and rescue at sea have been the subject of earlier posts on this blog, and it is good to see that a new book has now been published about women in the RNLI by Sue Hennessy.

The use of life jackets and shore-based lifeboats have saved untold numbers of lives since the days when the crew of the Christiana and countless other individuals on vessels like her suffered in vain.The RNLI remains one of the most important life-saving volunteer organisations in Britain and was a forerunner of many others around the world.
Here is a Flikr link to a recent photograph of the Berwick lifeboat.

The images below of Ancroft Church where the sailors are buried and the Berwick coast from http://www.geograph.org.uk/

© Copyright Martin Loader and Les Hull respectively.






Take up your pick, shovel and pan

Inspired by connections in the family tree to gold mining on three continents at both major and minor levels in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, I wondered what there is to be found on any women who discovered and mined gold in their own right, but there seem to be very few records in what was predominantly a male enterprise after all.
The most well-known gold rushes of the mid-19th Century were in California and Australia. Later rushes occurred in New Zealand and South America, Southern Africa, Canada, Alaska, and Russia, and it is inevitable that women went along for the ride. If not as long-suffering wives, daughters, or servants, most mining camps were beacons for prostitutes, and there must have been a number of enterprising women who indulged in cross-dressing in order to avoid detection. 

E. de Lacy Evans, 1879, State Library of Victoria

One of the more notorious of these was known as the "Sandhurst Impersonator", Mr/Mrs Edward de Lacy Evans, whose story caused a sensation in the press of the day. The best article on him/her appeared in a past issue of the La Trobe Journal and can be read online here.

As with most who-first-discovered-the-gold stories, they can abound with hysteria and myth, so one has to keep an open mind as to the real truth, but it now seems to be accepted that Margaret Kennedy and Julia Farrell, wives of workmen on the Ravenswood sheep run, found the first gold in Bendigo, Victoria, in 1851. It is said they were prospecting along Bendigo Creek when a newspaperman, Henry Frencham, spotted them with tins full of nuggets and reported the scene. See the history of gold in Bendigo.

Other than that shown below from the book "Water for Gold" by Dr Geoffrey Russell, there don't appear to be any images of these ladies who discovered the gold, although there is a delightful modern interpretation by Lucy Fekete and now owned by the Bendigo Historical Society, here on Flickr.

More on this topic in future posts.



Explorer or Bucket Carrier?

 

Many intrepid women have been involved with African exploration - with just two being the subjects of my most recent blogs - but what does it say about a country which occupies almost an entire continent and has no major female figures connected with its exploration?
The Australian Women's Register does not list any female explorers at all, in spite of the extensive list of occupations in which one can find many inspirational and adventurous Australian women.

Emily Caroline Robinson, later Creaghe, then Barnett, is given a single line:

Creaghe was the only woman member of Ernest Favenc's exploring party across Northern Australia in 1883.

However, the Register does include a link to her diary in the State Library of New South Wales which provides a few more details.

The Australian Dictionary of Biography has 234 names listed under the occupation of "Explorer" and Emily Caroline Barnett is the sole woman!
The truth is that she only seems to rate a mention because of the rediscovery of her diary and its publication in 2004, edited by Peter Monteath. This was followed in 2007 by an expedition in Emily's footsteps by the artist, Gemma Lynch-Memory, who took inspiration from Emily's journey to produce a series of paintings. According to Gemma's website this came about:

"After finding a copy of Emily's diary in a second-hand bookshop, Gemma became the first person to retrace the outback journey of Australia's first female explorer, Emily Caroline Creaghe. ... The expedition was featured on the ABC 7:30 Report and Gemma was recognised by the International Society of Female Explorers [sic] * based in New York. The touring exhibition received critical acclaim and was also featured in Australian Art Review magazine."

* There is no such organisation - possibly should read the Society of Women Geographers based in Washington, DC.

So what exactly did Emily Caroline do to finally bust through the gender barrier of Australian exploration? Apart from the summary offered by the ADB, the best account of her travels is in this article written for the National Library of Australia news magazine in 2006 by Judy Cannon.
The newspaper reports of the time mostly ignored her or simply included her as some kind of afterthought, as per this entry from The Maitland Mercury in July, 1883:

"Creaghe and party arrived at Catherine Waters accompanied by his wife"

while the South Australian Register accords her a bit more credit as:

"... the first lady who has made such an adventurous trip in Australia."

But was she truly an explorer in her own right, or was she unfortunately an appendage - a cook, bottle-washer and bucket-carrier - much like Mary Livingstone and similar wives who simply went along with adventuring husbands rather than be left behind?  This review by Gillian Dooley on the publication of her diary is somewhat scathing, as it does not show Emily Caroline in any particularly brave or inspiring light that would qualify her for the title of "explorer".

Emily Caroline Creaghe Barnett had another adventure later in life when in 1899, she was interviewed by the Sydney Morning Herald after an abortive trip to New Zealand during which the ship in which she was travelling lost its screw and subsequently spent seven weeks drifting and wallowing about the stormy Tasman Sea until rescue. Having to endure this discomfort with five children and a maid made two whole columns of print - considerably more than anything this first female "explorer" had accomplished in her crossing of the Outback in 1883.

It is rather disappointing that there are no other recorded important journeys by women across Australia during the exploration era. In the eyes of the Europeans of the time, the continent was seen to be unromantic and empty, with boring vistas and little of interest to discover either in the way of animals or people, even native plants were seen as prickly and unattractive. Australia certainly doesn't seem to have captured the imagination of wealthy adventuring women like May French-Sheldon or Alexine Tinne.  (Stories posted previously.)
So were all women tramping about remote areas of Australia in late 19th and early 20th Century mostly appendages and bucket carriers? It could seem that way, although this letter to the editor of the Northern Territory Times in 1921 hints that there were other women out there - tough, unsung pioneers who were probably too busy getting to where they were going by whatever route and means possible and had no time to bother with the frivolities of journals or diaries.

A trifle too seraphic ... Mademoiselle Tinne

Mademoiselle Tinne

Continuing with my current interest in female explorers, I note that this amusing bit of doggerel from Punch in June, 1893 has been included in a number of books and essays about the subject.

Lady an explorer? a traveller in skirts?

The notion's just a trifle too seraphic:

Let them stay and mind the babies, or hem our ragged shirts;

But they mustn't, can't and shan't be geographic.

Unlike women today who can grab a back-pack, jump on a plane and be in the remotest corner of the world within hours, the adventurous female who set off to explore unknown horizons in the 19th Century usually came from a privileged class. She would have had to have a certain amount of freedom and independence, financial security and a network of important connections. If she had children, she would probably have had someone else look after them anyway and any mending was always done by maids even when tramping about deserts. So it is hardly surprising when researching female explorers from this era to discover they were usually highly accomplished individuals, confident, well-educated and wealthy.

Alexine about to receive her death blows

 Alexandrine (Alexine) Tinne's father was a Dutch diplomat and entrepreneur who died in 1844 when Alexine was eight years old, leaving his wife and daughter one of the largest fortunes in the Netherlands at the time. From a young age, Alexine had a passion for the piano, languages and travel. According to some biographical articles, there seems to have been a brief romance that didn't amount to much. Together with her mother, and later an aunt, who became known as the Dutch Ladies Tinne, she travelled widely in Europe and later through Egypt and the Sudan. Alexine's mother and aunt both died from illnesses at Khartoum and Alexine herself was killed by Tuaregs on a subsequent expedition.
Various reports of Alexine's short life of 34 years are to be found on the Internet, many of them in Dutch or other languages. An English account appeared in Aramco magazine in 1983 although it conflicts somewhat with that provided by the Institute of Dutch History, particularly regarding Alexine's rather gruesome end.
 Like other female explorers of their age, the Tinne ladies did not travel "light". According to whichever report you believe, they had Dutch sailors and/or Irish porters to help them and Alexine took a heavy iron bed with her as well as porcelain china and silver tableware.

Apart from her exploring endeavours, Alexine has other claims to fame. She was also a highly accomplished photographer and some of the earliest photographs of The Hague were the work of Alexine Tinne.

The Hague c. 1860, photograph by Alexine Tinne

A genus of plants have also been named after her plantae tinneanae, and a book was published with her discoveries. See Botanicus. Unfortunately, most of the specimens and artefacts from her exhibitions were destroyed during the war.

Alexine Tinne is much better known in Continental Europe than in English-speaking countries. A number of books have been written about her and she has also been included in various anthologies of female explorers. A book in English about the three Ladies Tinne was published earlier this year (2010) The Dutch Ladies Tinne, in the Sudan by Anna Maria Abushama-Rademaker.

Dutch Ladies Tinne at Khartoum



Miss Tinne at Gerard Rohlfs' camp Tripoli 1869 (British Library)

(Note: copyright of some images in this post have been difficult to etablish with certainty as they are on non-English websites.)





Bebe Bwana. A Woman in Darkest Africa

A curious snippet in The Launceston Examiner (Tasmania) of 7 January 1891 reads as follows

A FEMALE AFRICAN EXPLORER
Mrs. Sheldon, an American lady, contemplates exploring Central Africa with a body guard of soldiers, who will be negresses

The images created by this report sent me scurrying to discover more. Who was Mrs. Sheldon and did she really have “negresses” as a bodyguard while exploring Central Africa?

Another slightly more accurate report in The Advertiser (Adelaide) of the same date states that Mrs. Sheldon, is “the widow of an American congressmen” and her body guard will include both “soldiers and negresses”. Six months later, another brief report in The Advertiser states:

MRS. SHELDON

Ill at Zanzibar.

June 19



Mrs. French-Sheldon, the American lady who recently undertook to explore Darkest Africa, is lying dangerously ill at Zanzibar. She sails for England at the earliest opportunity.

Further trawling of old newspaper reports revealed much more about this intriguing woman, that Mrs. Sheldon not only survived her illness at Zanzibar but went on to have many more adventures in Africa.

She was not yet a widow when she started out on her epic journey in 1891 and, most importantly, Mrs. Mary [or May] French-Sheldon, known to the Africans as "Bebe Bwana", in 1910, became the one of the first women to be appointed a Fellow of the Geographical Society.

She had already travelled around the world by the age of sixteen and later qualified as a medical doctor, ran a publishing company and wrote several books. She was friends with the explorer, Henry Morton Stanley, and was one of the few people not to condemn him over the atrocities with which he was reportedly connected in the Congo.

Mrs. Sheldon’s best-known work is a well-illustrated book about her first foray, called “Sultan to Sultan: Adventures among the Masai and other tribes of East Africa 1892”. From her book, it seems her ambition to take women porters wasn’t all that successful, as she says :

Although I had been strongly advised to take women porters to wash and for other duties, I found the few that I had were a perpetual nuisance. They were always inciting disputes among the porters, and resorted to all sorts of measures to win from them portions of food and other things which they coveted.

She goes to describe one tiny woman who ate so much she ended up “like a fatted pig” by the end of the safari and who was always in danger of being washed away when they crossed rivers so that Mrs Sheldon had to detail a male porter to look after her.



Unnamed female porters

However, I have this to say of the women porters, they compared admirably with the men both in staying qualities and strength, doing their day’s march with no more complaining, besides having superficial duties either incumbent upon them or volunteered, which the men had not.

One worthy addition to Mrs. Sheldon’s book is that unlike the books of most male explorers, she has taken the trouble to carefully list all 153 names of every porter or askari (soldier) who helped her.
Maybe there is some descendant in East Africa who knows what happened to some of the five women porters: Lidia, Beda, Suzzan, Burt Hamis and Burt Hamis Mzuria, but it is most unlikely as native people like them who helped white explorers are all long lost to history.

Mrs. Sheldon’s unique cane and bamboo palanquin was designed by her friend Henry S. Wellcome (founder of the pharmaceutical company that is now GlaxoSmithKline) and it was described in one newspaper report as containing all the comforts and luxuries of a Pullman palace car. There has probably been nothing quite like it in African safaris, before or since! On one occasion, a 15ft long python took a fancy to it and on waking up to discover this giant creature wrapped over her gave even the tough and redoubtable Mrs. Sheldon a case of the vapours!

Mrs. Sheldon's book can be found at the Internet Archive, and she is also the subject of a recent feminist biography "The White Queen" by Tracey Jean Boisseau, published by Indiana University Press.

All images from "Sultan to Sultan" and the Library of Congress.



Mrs. Sheldon's Guns



From the cave to the pole?

This wonderful cartoon image by Australian illustrator Matt Davidson says something about the achievements of feminism since the days of the cave-persons. It is amusing, but also rather alarming. What would the sufragettes have thought about a generation of women who think that sliding around almost naked on a pole is some kind of achievement for female equality?  Are we in danger of joining a slippery slide back to the caves? The article by Ardyn Bernoth that accompanies the cartoon can be read here.