Beatrice was the elder Sister of poet and writer Geraldine May Robertson-Glasgow
With thanks to John Butt - Great Great Nephew of Beatrice and her sister Geraldine
for sending me photographs of the sisters
Beatrice May Butt was born in Kensington, London in April 1853 and baptised on 29th May 1853. Her parents were Lt. Colonel Thomas Bromhead Butt (1821 - 1877), a British Army Officer, and his wife, Geraldine May, nee Sewell (1830 – 1898), who was from Quebec in Canada. Beatrice’s siblings were: Geraldine, who also became a writer and poet, b. 1854, Mary b. 1856, Gertrude J. b. 1861, William E. b. 1862, Catherine b. 1863 and Margaret L. b. 1864.
Educated at a boarding school in Stoke Newington, Hackney, London, Beatrice and her sister Geraldine went on to write books and became published authors in the 1870s, writing several books jointly. Beatrice was a friend of Oscar Wilde
In 1876, Beatrice married William Hutt Allhusen, son of a wealthy merchant from Newcastle upon Tyne. She died in Farnham Surrey 29 July 1918
Beatrice’s WW1 collection “April Moods and later verses” was published by Humphreys in 1917. She also had poems published in two WW1 anthologies.
“FROM BOSRAH” by Beatrice Allhusen
Who is this, in regal state, who cometh from afar,
His Tyrian purple garments dyed to a fierce blood-red,
His sword unsheathed and rusted with dreadful stains of war,
A crown of gold and jewels set on his royal head?
Triumphantly he passes o'er Edom's tranquil plain,
Death with his captives following across the ruined fields,
Unharvested, ungarnered, blood-stained the golden grain,
Where war demands the tribute that stubborn valor yields.
Before him spreads in radiance the glory of the world,
God's splendid gift that all men are bound to hold in trust ;
Behind him grief and anguish 'neath terror's flag unfurled,
Where flaming homes hide secrets of murder, rapine, lust.
This is he, whose regal state proclaims him Lord of War,
Death following in his footsteps, close as a new-made bride ;
With glittering spear uplifted he cometh from afar,
The crimson of his raiment in blood of thousands dyed.
* * * * * *
Who is this with wayworn feet and head in anguish bowed,
Blood-drops upon His vesture, His forehead bathed in sweat ;
Thorn-crowned, and gibed and jeered at amid a following crowd,
Who mock the stern endurance where God and man have met?
Here, strong to save, One cometh, speaking in righteousness,
Who in His blood-stained garments alone the wine-press trod;
No one stood by to answer the cry of His distress
When in His love and pity He faced the wrath of God.
This is He, the Lord of Peace, with travel-weary feet,
In crown of thorns, and stained with blood, who cometh from afar ;
He who, upon the reckoning day when God and man shall meet,
Shall show Himself a conqueror, triumphant over war.
Beatrice Allhusen. First published in “Chambers's Journal”.
From: “War verse” Edited by Foxcroft, Frank (1850-1921), (T.Y. Cronwell, New York, 1918) pp. 182- 183.
Sources:
Catherine W. Reilly,”English Poetry of the First World War: A Bibliography” (St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1978) pp. 10, 11 and 40
https://www.findmypast.co.uk/transcript?id=GBPRS/STAFF/BAP/1053506
https://archive.org/details/warverse01foxc
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.31175035232969&view=1up&seq=135
With grateful thanks to the Great Great Nephew of Beatrice - John Butt - who contacted me and kindly sent me these beautiful photographs.
