family history | Life in the English Cotswolds

Educator, economist, suffragist and founder of the National Council for the Unmarried Mother & Child (later to become known as the charity, Gingerbread).

Lettice Fisher, the eldest daughter of Sir Courtney Peregrine Ilbert came from a political family. Born 14^th June 1875 in London, her father was responsible for the drafting of parliamentary bills and was later to become Clerk to the House of Commons. Her mother, Jessie, was a daughter of the Reverend Charles Bradley and her great-grandfather, another Reverend Charles Bradley was instrumental in the abolition of slavery. At the time of Lady Ilbert’s death in 1924, she was described as “one of the most remarkable political women of her time.” It was to this background of politics and campaigning that the young Lettice grew up.

Educated in London and at Somerville College, Oxford, Lettice later returned to Oxford in 1902 to teach history at St Hugh’s College. Whilst at Oxford she also taught economics to women and became an active suffragist. For two years from 1916 she was Chair of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies.

It was during WW1 that Lettice became involved with the women munition workers of Sheffield. Disturbed by the increase in wartime illegitimacy, the difficulties and prejudices the women faced, as well as the higher death rates of their babies, she founded in 1918 the National Council for the Unmarried Mother & Child. Campaigning for the reform of the discriminatory Bastardy Acts and Affiliation Orders Acts, the council gave advice and assistance to single mothers. Lettice remained in her role as first chair of the council until 1950. Much later in its history the council merged to become known as the charity, Gingerbread.

Lettice Ilbert married Herbert Albert Laurens Fisher (known as HAL Fisher), her Oxford tutor in early July 1899. They had one daughter, Mary – later Mary Bennett – who became principal of St Hilda’s College, Oxford. After HAL’s untimely death in 1940, Lettice moved from Oxford to Thursley, Surrey where she died from heart failure in 1956. Her ashes are interred at New College, Oxford where HAL had been warden for many years until the time of his death.

The theme of this year’s United Nations International Women’s Day is “Women in leadership: achieving an equal future in a Covid-19 world.” I’m not qualified to write about current matters but I am quite certain that Lettice Fisher embraced the qualities that are still needed today. One hundred years ago, Lettice Fisher found that the terrible aftermaths of World War and the ‘flu epidemic which caused even greater deaths and hardship, only hardened her resolve to tackle women’s rights, prejudice and injustice. Sadly, in many places in the world, these issues are still very much outstanding.

Why my interest in Lettice Fisher? Lettice Fisher (nee Ilbert) is an ancestral cousin through our mutual descent of the Bradley family.

Sometimes I get asked the question why do I write. The answer is usually just because I always have. Recently I’ve given more thought to it and I think that perhaps it is because (apart from having something to say) I like the way words look as much as the way they sound when arranged on a page. You can almost play games with them, juggling the written and the spoken so that both the emphasis and flow change. Nowhere is that more pronounced than with poetry.

*Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Poet Laureate* *[photo credit: Wikipedia]*

To be honest, I struggle a bit with poetry. I feel I ought to like it more. There are some that I love because they remind me of childhood although having to learn and recite, The Lady of Shallott didn’t excite me at the time. Having to read a poem at the front of the class must have destroyed any potential to love poetry for many a generation of children. I adore some of Christina Rosetti’s poems but mostly poetry is for me rather like jazz or wine – I know what I like and, sometimes, I discover a new one that is to my taste.

*this beautiful angel statue is in the Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin, Ireland*

The quote in the photo is from Tennyson’s Maud. Of course, I knew the old song, Come Into The Garden, Maud that quickly rose to popularity as a parlour song. Because of this I assumed, like so many others, that Maud must be a love poem. Certainly, my quote above which comes earlier in the poem would make you think so.

a classic rendition of Come Into the Garden, Maud dating from 1940

Maud is one of Tennyson’s epic poems; a tale of hatred, infatuation, of death and destruction and the decline into insanity and, later, of war. The poem certainly wasn’t loved by the public when it was first published in 1855. So why do I find it so fascinating?

*transcription of letter from Tennyson to George Granville Bradley* *1855*

Many readers of my blog share an interest in genealogy and family history. I have been researching mine for many years and have shared some of my ‘finds’ and stories here. One such discovery was the long friendship between Tennyson and my ancestral cousin, George Granville Bradley. Bradley was first the Headmaster of both Rugby and Marlborough Schools before becoming the Dean of Westminster Abbey. Both he and Tennyson shared a love of geology, then in its early days of understanding. They would roam the hills of the Isle of Wight together where they both lived geologising and reciting poetry. The discovery of correspondence between them on the merits of Maud and how it may be altered before publication both excited and intrigued me. Here was one of Britain’s greatest poets, a Poet Laureate, seeking advice from a cousin of mine! I purchased an old copy of Tennyson to read it with a renewed interest and the rest – as they say – is (family) history.