Wives in the shadow (1). The Lady of the Lake.

This will be the first in a new series of posts about some of the women who were connected to the administrators or other prominent men instrumental in the running of the British Empire. Often, these men remain famous and are still commemorated in statues, geographical features, books, etc. or remembered in other ways, but the women in their lives are for the most part shadowy figures and all but forgotten.

The Lady of the Lake (Lady Swettenham #1). 

Sydney Lake, Kuala Lumpur

Port Swettenham was a name familiar to me as a child from several pages in my father’s stamp collection headed “Straits Settlements”. In what is now Malaysia, the port is now Port Klang but it was originally named after the first Resident-General and later Governor of the Straits Settlement, Sir Frank Athelstane Swettenham, a man said to rank in importance in the region with Sir Stamford Raffles, the founder of Singapore.  Frank’s brother, Sir James Alexander Swettenham, also had links to the region.

In May 1938, divorce on the grounds of incurable insanity was allowed for the first time in the British court system. One of the first petitions brought was by Sir Frank Swettenham against his wife Lady Constance Sydney Swettenham. Frank had married her sixty years earlier in 1878 when she was only 19, a daughter of Cecil Frederick Holmes, housemaster at Harrow School. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography gives only a little information about her:

Her inherited tendency towards manic depression was exacerbated by Swettenham's treatment of her; the marriage blighted his personal life for sixty years

and

In 1894 Swettenham's wife returned to Perak from the most serious of several mental breakdowns, pregnant by another man. Swettenham dispatched her in semi-public ignominy to Britain, where her son was described as stillborn. Swettenham's own personal life was far from blameless; a misdemeanour formed the basis for blackmail, to which he was subjected from about 1890 until his retirement in 1904.

While Swettenham certainly was a highly accomplished administrator on behalf of the Empire, he clearly wasn’t good husband material, or he simply chose the wrong woman. Was Sydney (she seems to have preferred this name to Constance) already on the edge when she married Frank and what exactly was it in his treatment of her that tipped her over? What were the real circumstances of her pregnancy? Without knowing Sydney’s side of the story and only that of Sir Frank on the record, it has to remain conjecture.

The imperious man of empire as seen
 by John Singer Sargent

Frank first tried to rid himself of Sydney in England in 1904, bringing a petition for divorce and accusing her of adultery with a man called Ernest Henry Mander. The paperwork for this divorce petition has just recently been released under the 100 year rule and makes for interesting reading. 

The judge believed Sydney when she said she wanted a reconciliation with her husband and so he threw out Frank’s petition. This indicates that the judge considered the adultery charges to be false, and it tends to raise more questions as to other motives behind Frank wanting a divorce. It seems that Sydney was abandoned to her own devices for months and years at a time, yet Frank still expected her to undertake wifely imperial duties as and when he insisted on them. As the ODNB is so vague on the circumstances of Sydney’s pregnancy and stillborn child, it seems rather too convenient that the baby didn’t survive and it could be there was a cover-up to avoid further embarrassment. Perhaps he did survive and was quietly set up for private adoption as was often the case with upper class “mistakes” during this era.

Whatever the real facts, poor Sydney Swettenham seems to have had a blighted life at the hands of an overbearing and arrogant husband who was rather typical of such men of his time, but she continued to insist she was sane when the second divorce petition was brought in May, 1938. 

In June 1939, Sir Frank, then aged almost 90, married his long-time live-in lover (Lady Swettenham #2). Sydney died a year after Frank, in 1947.

Malaysian playwright and actor Sabera Shaik was intrigued by this sad story and recently wrote and acted in a play called Lady Swettenham about Sydney that has been presented in India and a number of other Asian countries.

This only accessible photo is alleged to be Constance Sidney [sic]  (unable to confirm as Harrow Photos website currently unavailable) but from the feathers in her hair this suggests this would have been her in debutante dress rather than her wedding.

Copyright ? Harrow Photos

The old Port Swettenham has long gone from the map, but at least some small vestige of Sydney lives on in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia, and Sydney Lake is the centrepiece of the Lake Gardens.

Several images of Sir Frank taken by Gertrude Bell can be found at the Newcastle University Library

Link to the Pistol Packin' Empress

As this lady certainly didn't carry buckets and was more more likely to put them on the heads of serfs and use them for target practice, read all about the Empress Anne Ivanova on my other blog Digging the Dust.

Empress Anna

More sinned against than sinning

A recent visit to the Cascades Female Factory in Hobart, Tasmania, was a most moving experience for me. Being the sole female in the audience of an interactive guided tour that tells the story of a young woman convict, I felt the full force of it. The two actors were excellent, and the booming wrath of the male overseer really put the fear into me and gave me an inkling of the terror and helplessness the poor women incarcerated in this dreadful place would have experienced.

From the memorial to the women who passed through Cascades

One aspect that particularly made me shudder was being sent to the solitary or dark cells. Without any light source and measuring about a yard wide and two yards long, just enough room to stand up and lie down in, a woman could be locked up in here for weeks or months for all kinds of reasons, including having had a baby out of wedlock, even if she had been a victim of rape or abuse at the hands of an overseer or employer to whom she had been assigned. It would have taken a woman of extraordinary mental resilience and courage to have survived such an experience and not emerge from the darkness totally insane. Yet some remarkable women did recover, went on to lead normal lives after they earned their freedom and become the founding mothers of a nation.

Remains of the cells.  Read more here

But what is also disturbing is that this appalling treatment of women wasn’t confined to just the faraway convict colonies of Australia in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Despite growing enlightenment over prison reforms, dark cells were still being constructed in British prisons. Here is a map dated 1875 from the Northumberland Archives of a proposed female dark cell to be built at Morpeth Gaol (now converted to luxury apartments). As of writing this, I don’t know if this cell was ever completed and used, but sincerely hope that it wasn’t and possibly someone reading this might be able to tell me more.

Copyright Northumberland Archives. Click here for larger version.

Morpeth Gaol today

"Fastest woman on earth"

While researching an article for my other other blog Digging the Dust on dangerous hair accessories for automobiling females, I came across this Wikipedia entry for Dorothy Levitt, described as the “fastest woman on earth”.

And here is yet another ground-breaking woman of whom I knew nothing previously and despite quite a few links on that Wikipedia page it seems she has not yet warranted a full biography.

A couple of years ago, the documentary Penelope Keith and the Fast Lady was made by BBC4 but it doesn’t seem to have had world-wide distribution as I certainly would have watched if I had ever known about it.

Dorothy seems to have made her name mostly with automobiles, but hidden away among reports about her is the fact that she set the world’s first water speed record. Various American newspapers reported on her enthusiastically, as in this article from the Los Angeles Herald of January 6 1907 in which she lays down the gauntlet to American women to challenge her. (To read the full enlarged text, follow this Chronicling America link.)

And this other one from The Minneapolis Journal of 25 November, 1906, that features her water speed record as well. (Again, read the enlarged text in full at Chronicling America.)

Also note the bizarre torpedo-like invention down in the right hand corner to make women swim faster!

Rather than repeat what many other bloggers have already written about Dorothy Levitt, here are several links that will tell you more:

Grace’s Guide

TheScarf & Goggles Social Club

Speedqueens

Rootschat (her genealogy)

TheTruth About Cars

Dr Molinarius

A reprint of Dorothy’s book The Woman and the Car

Christine Granville ... "nothing remotely civil"

As a follow-up to my earlier posts on little-known women who have won the George Medal, I have just read the story of another more famous recipient of this award, Christine Granville, born Krystyna Skarbek, the subject of the recent book by Clare Mulley entitled The Spy Who Loved. 

I was astonished to learn that Christine had originally been recommended for the George Cross but was "downgraded" to a George Medal and that even that didn't come easily. I quote the following passage from Clare Mulley's book which demonstrates the attitudes Christine was up against in spite of her incredible bravery that was equal to that of any man:

"Christine's courage and achievements throughout her service were admired by everyone who knew her. In December 1944, General Stawell had recommended her for the George Cross, the civil equivalent to the Victoria Cross, for her 'nerve, coolness and devotion to duty, and high courage'. But Christine was not impressed. The only medal that she would be proud to wear she told Francis [Cammaerts] would be a military medal. It was 'typical' of her, he said, that this was the one honour she could not hope to get.'  Women were ineligible for British military honours, a situation that caused another female agent, Pearl Witherington, to protest that 'there was nothing remotely civil' about what they had done. For reasons not recorded, General Alexander, the Supreme Allied Commander of the Mediterranean Theatre, then downgraded Stawell's recommendation for Christine to an OBE. This was subsequently raised to a George Medal by the War Office to 'make it obvious that she had been decorated for gallantry, as her courage was outstanding'."

The Spy who Loved

My own review of the book can be read on my other blog Regina the Bookspinner here.

Female maestros - a passing "novelty"?

After writing about three women who received public accolades for their physical bravery, I now return to what this blog was originally intended to be about: women who have made their mark in some way in spite of the obstacles in their paths.

While they may not be literally hauling buckets any more, women are still battling through fields that are predominantly male preserves. There was considerable dismay in Australia recently after its voters threw out their first female prime minister and replaced her with a conservative regime that has only one woman on its front bench. Even the opposition has reverted to jobs for the boys.

That led me to thinking about another area in which women seem to still be poorly represented – despite it being in the usual female-friendly area of music and the arts – and that is conducting orchestras.

It doesn't take long to find plenty of articles online bemoaning the lack of female conductors of major orchestras, not helped by recent sexist and fatuous remarks by Vassily Petrenko as to why there are so few. His comments drew a great deal of flak with even demands that he resign as conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic. Read them here and here.

But it is difficult to find any authoritative information on who really was the very first woman to lead a prestigious orchestra with both a national and international reputation.

As far as USA goes, one suggestion is that she was Mary Davenport Engberg, who warrants a pathetic six-line Wikipedia entry although this link to a Washington State history site gives a few more details about her.

Antonia Brico (1902-1989)

A better candidate is Antonia Brico, who conducted the New York Philharmonic in 1930 and also guest conducted at the Berlin Philarmonic. More on her in this Encylopaedia Britannica entry, but this sentence neatly sums up what the bosses of big orchestras really thought about female conductors back then and perhaps the same attitude still lingers today.

"After the mid-1940s, perhaps as her [Brico’s] novelty disappeared, she found it increasingly difficult to gain serious attention in the traditionally male field she had chosen, her manifest ability notwithstanding."

In the UK, Iris Margaret Lemare is acknowledged as the first professional British woman conductor and a tireless supporter of the music of British composers yet she doesn’t seem to warrant a Wikipedia entry although she has an extensive entry in the Oxford Dictionary of Biography. Her obituary here.

Dame Ethel Smyth was perhaps better-known as a composer and also gained more notoriety as a sufragette and associate of the Bloomsbury Set later in life, but in 1928 she was reputedly the first woman to conduct the Berlin Philarmonic.

Veronika Dudarova (1916-2009)

Russia has had women conductors for a long time and the most famous and enduring was probably Veronika Dudarova. 

Teresa Carreno from Venezuela (she said she was a grand-niece of Simon Bolivar) was another early woman conductor. 

The newspaper archives carry reports on many women conductors of small, private or localised orchestras in the early part of the last century, including mention of one Australian, Marguerite Edwards, who allegedly became the first woman conductor in South Africa in the early 1900s but on whom I can find no further information.

Then there is Contessa Anne McParland Filippini that various sources credit with being the first acknowledged Australian female conductor yet she has no specific web link and few other references other than being notable as ancestor of her infinitely better-known grandson, musician Paul Kelly. It is strange that neither she nor her husband Count Ercole Filippini and the orchestra that they founded have been recorded in the Australian Dictionary of Biography or similar sources. A short book was published about her in 1988 but is obviously long out of print.

As to the first mention of any woman conducting music, this cryptic sentence appears in Samuel Pepys’ diary of 6 June 1661.

" ... we went and eat and drank and heard musique at the Globe, and saw the simple motion that is there of a woman with a rod in her hand keeping time to the musique while it plays, which is simple, methinks."

Was she really conducting the “musique” as in a band or orchestra, or was she just some woman tapping time to the tune, or was it some kind of automaton or clockwork figure, as seems most likely and suggested by the comments to be read on the Pepys site.

If anyone reading this can provide more information on early female orchestra conductors I would be most interested in hearing about them.

Simone Young in action. Copyright Sahlan Hayes, The Age

A number of woman conductors present and past from around the world can be found from this link. Once you start looking for them, their range of nationalities, capabilities and accomplishments are truly amazing, so there is great hope for the future of female conducting ... if they can only manage to break through the glass ceiling!

Here are just a few:

Tomoni Mishimoto from Japan has conducted the Bolshoi Orchestra.

Alondra de la Parra is from Mexico and a noted rising star.

Australian Simone Young was the first woman to crack the all-male Vienna Philharmonic.

Marin Alsop is American and conducts both the Baltimore and Sao Paulo Symphony Orchestras and in 2013 became the first woman to conduct the Last Night of the Proms in London.

Another highly respected American conductor is Jo Ann Falletta.

Xian Zhang is Chinese-American and conducts the Milan Symphony and has also appeared at the Proms.

Sarah Ioannides is another true international of Greek parentage, born in Canberra Australia, raised in the UK and has conducted at Carnegie Hall.

Diane Wittry is another American conductor with an amazing CV and who has written books of instruction on conducting.

Iona Brown (1941-2004)

Iona Brown was primarily associated with chamber orchestras, but also conducted many famous symphony orchestras including the London Philharmonic, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Hallé, Bournemouth Symphony, Danish Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, and Tokyo Philharmonic.

Ruth Gipps (1921-1999) was a composer well-known for inspiring music in young people but allegedly lost out as conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony due to sexist prejudice of the time.

This is a  great photo of Sarah Ioannides from her web gallery

Copyright Sarah Ioannides

Female George Medal Recipients (3)

A more sensational peace-time event that earned a young woman the George Medal took place in Australia in 1972. It was known as the Faraday School Kidnapping, and its hero was Mary Elizabeth Gibbs.

Miss Gibbs was 20 years old and in charge of the one-teacher school in Faraday in the farming area near the town of Castlemaine, in the State of Victoria. Two armed men broke into the school and abducted Gibbs and six of her female students (four were away due to illness).  The men left a ransom note for $1,000,000 and forced their hostages into a van and drove into a forest. To stop the children from being frightened, Miss Gibbs pretended it was a game and sang songs to them during the night. Just before dawn, she discovered that the men had left the front of the van and she urged the children to kick open the back door with her. They were lucky as the door came free and they were able to make their escape.

Connected to this event was another feat of bravery on the part of the State of Victoria's Minister for Education at the time, Lindsay Thompson. He later became Premier of the State. He delivered the ransom money in person to the place where the hostages were being kept, but fortunately they had escaped before the money could be handed over. In an amazing second incident, five years later after the kidnapper had been released from prison he attempted the same thing, abducting a teacher and group of students in rural Gippsland. Mr Thompson rushed to the scene where he intended to offer himself in exchange for the hostages, but the kidnapper was arrested after a shoot-out with the police. (One can't imagine a modern politician putting his life on the line like this!). More about the late Lindsay Thompson here. 

Lindsay Thompson, Mary Gibbs and Christine Ellery (former student) at Faraday School 2004.
Copyright The Age

One important outcome of these events was that one-teacher schools in remote areas of Australia became a thing of the past and hastened the closure of other rural schools with low enrolments.

More on the Faraday kidnapping story here and more detail in the links below. (They may work, or not, depending on your location as all these newspapers now charge for such archival records.)

Author Gabrielle Lord wrote a novel called Fortress, loosely based on the event and which spawned a movie of the same name.

Herald Sun

The Australian

The Age