Revised list of poets July 2013

FEMALE POETS OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR

Here is the latest list – July 2013.  I find new poets and interesting information every day.  As always if you know of any poets I have left out, please get in touch.  I am particularly keen to find poets from Luxembourg, Thailand and from African countries but all poets of the era are welcome.   

Someone asked if I was only including 'professional' poets.  Definitely not - as far as I am concerned you do not have to be a 'published' poet to write poetry.   Do have a look at what Dr. Olson said in his review of George Bruce's anthology further down the blog.   I agree with Bruce about poetry - this was not always the case but the past year has led to amazing discoveries and helped me to change my mind. 

Thank you all for your loyalty.

As my research has progressed, it has become very clear that there were far more women who wrote poetry during the 1914 - 1918 period than the few mentioned in many of the anthologies compiled so far.   I feel strongly that their voices deserve to be heard.

REVISED LIST JULY 2013

BRITAIN

Margot Robert ADAMSON (1898 - ) Scottish  ?

Georgette AGNEW ?

Marian ALLEN (1892 – 1953) b. Australia

Jessie Annie ANDERSON (b. 1861 – Scottish ?

Lilian M. ANDERSON (1866 – 1946) Scottish ?

Marion ANGUS (1866 - 1946) - Scottish

Lady ASHMORE - Scottish

Edith BAGNOLD (27th October 1889 - 31st March 1981) (Nurse then driver in France)

Rachel BATES (Wirral)

Dorothy Julie BAYNES ?

Mary BEAZLEY ?

Madeline Ida BEDFORD – Munitions poem

Janet BEGBIE ?

Maud Anna BELL (Serbian Relief Fund) (1861 – 1947) ?

Frances BELLERBY (1899 – 1975) -

Stella BENSON (1892 - 1933)

Matilda BETHAM-EDWARDS (1836 – 1919)

Nora BOMFORD

Lilian BOWES LYON (1895 - 1949)

Mary Elizabeth BOYLE (brother killed opening days of the War)

Catherine BRIDSON (Wirral)

Beatrix BRICE MILLER 

Sybil BRISTOWE (brother killed early 1917)

Vera BRITTAIN (1896 - 1970) (Nurse - VAD - Brother killed Italy)

Judith BRUNDRETT-TWESDALE
BRYHER - pen name

Alice Mary BUCKTON (1867 - 1944) (Emigrated to South Africa)

C.A.L.T.

May WEDDERBURN-CANNAN (1893 - 1973) (VAD + Intelligence Service; engaged to Bevil Quiller-Couch)

Elizabeth CHANDLER FORMAN

Mary G. CHERRY

Mary  CHOLMONDELEY (niece of Stella Benson) (8.6.1859 – 15.07.1925) (worked as a clerk in Carlton House Terrace Hospital)

Agatha CHRISTIE (nee Miller) (1890 – 1976 VAD Torquay)

Isabel C. CLARKE (born Plymouth)

Alice E. COLLINGE (1869 – 1960)

Mary Gabrielle COLLINS

Frances CORNFORD (1886 – 1960)

Margaret CROPPER

Nancy CUNARD (1896 - 1965)

Elizabeth DARYUSH (Daughter of Robert Bridges) (1887 - 1977)

Helena DEREZINSKA (Lancashire)

Helen DIRCKS

Eva DOBELL (1867 - 1963) (Niece of poet Sydney Dobell) (Nurse)

Sarah DOUDNEY (1841 - 1926)

Agnes E. DREY (Lancashire)

Helen Parry EDEN (1885 -

Agnes FALCONER

Eleanor FARJEON (London; 1881 - 1965)

V. Helen FRIEDLAENDER

Lilian GARD

Alexandra Ethelreda GRANTHAM (eldest son killed WW1)

Nora GRIFFITHS

I. GRINDLEY (Queen Mary's Army Auxilliary Corps)

Diana GURNEY

Dorothy Frances GURNEY (1858 – 1932)

Cicely HAMILTON

Helen HAMILTON

Isabel WESTCOTT HARPER

Ada May HARRISON

Agnes CROZIER HERBERTSON

May HERSHEL-CLARKE

Ethel M. HEWITT

Constance HOLLAR

Winifred HOLTBY (Nursed in France)

Theresa HOOLEY

Violet HUNT

Isobel W. HUTCHISON

Mildred HUXLEY

Catherine M. JACKSON (Wirral)

Violet JACOB ( d. 1947 - Born Violet Kennedy-Erskine in Scotland m. Major Arthur Jacob of 20th Hussars)

Storm JAMESON

Elinor JENKINS (1893 - 1920)

Edith A. KAHIA (Lancashire)

Anna GORDON KEOWN

Annie L. KNOWLES (Lancashire)

Margery LAWRENCE

Winifred M. LETTS (1882 - 1972)

Olive E. LINDS

Mina LOY (1882 -

Geraldine E. LYSTER (Lancashire)

Irene Rutherford McLEOD

Dame Rose MACAULAY (1881 - 1958) (Descendent of Lord Macaulay)

Helen MACKAY (1891 - 1965)

Nina MACDONALD

Miss Isobel MARCHBANK

Nina MARDEL (VAD)

Alice MAUD

Charlotte MEW

Alice MEYNELL (1847 - 1922)

Olga MILLER (nee KATZIN) (1896 -

Sophie MILLER

Frances Evelyn MILLETT

Miss G.M. MITCHELL

Naomi MITCHISON - Scottish
Lady Gertrude MOBERLEY (1860 -

Edith NESBIT (1858 - 1924) (m. BLAND)

Eileen NEWTON

The Honourable Eleanour NORTON (1881 - )

Moira O'NEILL (1864 - 1955)

Carola OMAN (1897 - 1978) Nurse with Red + Western Front 1916 - 1919 m. Sir Geralde Lenanton

Florence OVERTON (Lancashire)

Elsie May PATERSON CRANMER (1893 - 

Margaret PETERSON (1883 – 1933) Pen name:  Glint Green)

Ruth PITTER (7 November 1897 - 29 February 1992) (Worked at the War Office 1915 - 1917

Jessie POPE (18.3.1868 - 14.12.1941 - b, Leicester m. Babington Lenton

Dame Margaret POSTGATE COLE (1893 - 1980)

Irene R. POTTER

Mary PRALL

Marjorie PRATT

Louise PRIOR

Inez QUILTER (aged 11)

Dollie RADFORD (nee Maitland) (1858 – 1920)

Elsie S. RAE - Scottish

Dorothy Una RATCLIFFE (1887 - 1967 b. Yorkshire)

Constance Ada RENSHAW (Sheffield. 1891 - 1964)

Dorothy RICHARDSON (b. Abingdon 17th May 1873 - d. Beckenham 17th June 1957. m. Alan Odle 1917)

Ursula ROBERTS (1887 - 1975) (b. India; educated Highgate and London University) Pen name Susan MILES)

Margaret E. ROWNTREE (nee Fish m. 1926) (Born Fleetwood 1899 - 1983)

Lady Margaret SACKVILLE (1881 - 1963)

Vita SACKVILLE-WEST (1892 - 1962)

Dorothy L. SAYERS (1893 – 1957)

Ethel SCHEFFAUER

Lady Aimee BYNG SCOTT (1868 - 1953)

Edith HOPE-SCOTT (Lancashire)

Fredegond SHOVE (nee MAITLAND) (1889 – 1949)

May SINCLAIR (born Rock Ferry, Wirral 1865 - 1946) Nurse in France 1914

Edith SITWELL (born Scarborough 1887 - 1964)

Cicely FOX SMITH (Born Lymm, Cheshire; educated Manchester)

Stevie SMITH (1902 - 1971) "Not waving but drowning"

Freya STARK (1893 - 1993)

Dorothy Margaret STEWART

Suzanne STONE

Marie Carmichael STOPES (1880 - 1954) (First female science lecturer at Manchester University)

Muriel STUART (  - 1967) (Founded P.E.N. Club in 1921)

Millicent SUTHERLAND ((1867 - 1955)(Milicent Gower, Duchess of Sutherland) (Nurse in France. Painted by Victor Tardieu)

Mary SYMON (1863 – 1938)

Emily HOWSON TAYLOR (1879 -

Gwen TAYLOR 

Rachel Annand TAYLOR (1876 - 1960)

Ruth TAYLOR 

Joan THOMPSON (With the Red Cross to France)

Aelfrida TILLYARD (1883 - 

Iris TREE (1897 - 1968) (Bloomsbury Group - friend of Nancy Cunard)

Alys FANE TROTTER (1863 - 1962) lived in South Africa during 1890s

Ada TYRELL

Evelyn UNDERHILL   (worked with SSAFA and Naval Intelligence)

Viviane VERNE

Alberta VICKRIDGE (b. Bradford, Educated Bradford Girls' Grammar. VAD nurse)

Annie VIVANTI CHARTRES (1866 – 1942)

Sylvia TOWNSEND WARNER (1893 -  1978) Worked in Munitions Factory WW1

Mary WEBB (1881 - 1927 b. Leighton, nr. Wrekin, Shropshire; educated Southport)

Mary Morison WEBSTER

M. Winifred WEDGWOOD (VAD)

Dorothy WELLESLEY (1889 - 1956) 

Catherine DURNING WHETHAM (Devon)

Lucy WHITMELL

Anna WICKHAM (1884 - 1947)

Carolyn Crosby WILSON

Marjorie WILSON

Margaret L. WOODS (1856 -

Elizabeth WORDSWORTH (1840 - 1932)

AMERICA

Zoe AKINS (1886 - 1958)

Margaret Steele ANDERSON (1867 - 1921)


Karle Wilson BAKER (1878 - 1960)

Djuna BARNES (1892 - 1982)

Natalie Clifford BARNEY (1876 - 1972; lived in Paris for over 60 years)

Pauline BARRINGTON (1876 - 

Katharine Lee BATES (12.081859 - 28.03.1929: "America the Beautiful")

Louise BOGAN (1897 - 1970)

Mary BORDEN (lived in England.  Mobile hospital in France)

Amelia Josephine BURR (1878 - 1968)

Nancy CAMPBELL

Grace ELLERHY CHANNING (1862 - 1937; France and Italy as a War Correspondent)

Florence Earle COATES (1850 - 1927)

Helen Gray CONE (1859 - 1934)

Grace Hazard CONKLING (1878 - 1958)

Adelaide CRAPSEY

Charlotte Holmes CRAWFORD

Olive TILFORD DARGAN

Mary Carolyn DAVIES

Hilda Dolittle or H.D. (

Vita DUTTON-SCUDDER (1861 - 1954)


Gabrielle ELLIOTT (American Fund for French Wounded; Nursing Committee for the Council of National Defence)

S. Gertrude FORD

Lena GILBERT BROWN FORD


Theodosia GARRISON

Charlotte Perkins GILMAN (1860 - 1935)

Louise Imogen GUINEY (1861 - 1920)

Mary M.J. HENDERSON (Lived in UK. Went to Russia and Serbia with Elsa Inglis)

Alice Corbin HENDERSON (1881 - 1949)

Katherine HOWARD


Amy LOWELL (1874 - 1925)


Florence RIPLEY MASTIN

Moina BELLE MICHAEL (The Poppy Lady)

Ruth Comfort MITCHELL

Edna St. Vincent MILLAY

Harriet MONROE

Marianne MOORE (1887 - 1972)

Aline MURRAY (1888 - 1941)


Grace Fallow NORTON (1876 - 1926)

Dorothy PARKER

Mary PIERCY

Lizette WOODWORTH REESE (1856 - 1935)

Edith Grenstead ROCHESTER

Edith RUTTER-LEATHAM


Vida Dutton SCUDDER (1861 - 1954)

Gertrude STEIN

Charlotte PERKINS STETSON


Sarah TEASDALE

Lesbia THANET

Edith M. THOMAS (1854 - 1925)

Rose Hartwick THORPE (1850 - 1939)

Marie van VORST (Organised American Ambulance Corps; set up workshops in Rome)

Grace O. VANAMEE (1876 - 1946)


Mrs G.O. WARREN

Edith WHARTON (1862 - 1937) (Paris WW1 - nursed)

Ella WHEELER WILCOX (1850 - 1919) (To the Western Front in 1918)

Margaret WIDDAMER

Margaret ADELAIDE WILSON

AUSTRIA

*Ingeborg BACHMANN (1926 - 1973)
Vicky BAUM (1888 - 1960)
Paula LUDWIG (1900 - 1974)

* Although she is not relevant to the period, Ingeborg is her by kind permission and suggestion of Mike Lyons, who translated some of Ingeborg's poems.  Mike very kindly sent me a copy of his book.

AUSTRO-HUNGARIA

Rose Auslander (11.05.1901 – 03.01.1988)

AUSTRALIA

Emily BULCOCK (1877 - 1969)

Ada CAMBRIDGE A.C. (1844 - 1926)

Violet B. CRAMER

Zora CROSS (1890 - 1964)

Edith May ENGLAND (1899 - 1979)

Nellie EVANS (1883 - 1944)

May Hannay FOOT (1846 - 1918)

Mary Elizabeth FULLERTON (1868 - 1946)

Dame Mary GILMORE (1965 - 1962)

Lesbia HARFORD (1891 - 1927)

Winsome JENNINGS

Alice GORE JONES (1887 - 1961)

Marion KNOWLES

Dorothea McKELLAR

Agnes ROSE-SOLEY

Ethel TURNER (1870 - 1958) - born Doncaster, England)

Elizabeth von AMIN (1866 - 1941)

BELGIUM

Marie NIZET (1859 - 1922)

Alice NAHON (1896 - 1938)

BRAZIL

Cora CORALINA (20 August 1889 – 10 April 1985)

Cecilia MEIRELES (7.11.1901 – 9.11.1964)

Adaligsa NERY (29.10.1905 – 7.6.1980)

CANADA

Jean BLEWETT (1872 - 1934)

Helene Jane COLEMAN (1860 - 1953)

Marie JOUSSAYE (1864 - 1949)

Susan Frances HARRISON (1859 - 1935)

Norah M. HOLLAND (1876 - 1925) - Mother related to W.B. Yeats

Isabel MACKAY (Isabel Ecclestone - 1875 - 1928)

Lucy Maud MONTGOMERY (1874 - 1942)

Marjorie L.C. PICKTHALL (1883 - 1922)

CHILE

Gabriela MISTRAL (1889 - 1957 - pen name of Lucila Godoy Alcayaga)

CHINA

Bing Xin

FRANCE

Adrienne BLANC-PERIDIER (1884 - 1965)
Henriette CHARASON (1884 - 1972)

Marie DAUGUET (1860 - 1942)

Lise DEHARME (1898? - 1980)

Lucie DELARUE-MARDRUS (1874 - 1945- nurse in WW1)

Marguerite DURAND (Editor of La Fronde)

Rosemonde GERARD (1886 - 1953)

Miriam HARRY (Maria Rosette SHAPIRA)

Gerard d'HOUVILLE (Nom de plume - 1875 - 1963)

Amelie MURAT (1882 - 1940)

Anna de NOAILLES (1876 - 1933)

Louisa PAULIN (1888 - 1944)
Valentine PENROSE (nee BOUE) (1898 - 1978)

Cecile PERIN (1877 - 1959)
Henriette SAURET

Cecile SAUVAGE (1883 - 1927)

Colette YVER (

GERMANY

Lou ALBERT-LAZARD (1885 - 1969) artist and poet

Anna BAHR-HILDENBERG ?
Emmy BALL-HENNINGS (1885 - 1948) m. DADA poet Hugo Ball
Maria BENEMANN (1887 - 1980)
Trude BERNHARD (??)
Frida BETTINGEN (1865 - 1924)

Isla FRANKE (1881 - 1938)

Claire GOLL (1890 - 1977)
Henriette HARDENBERG (1894 - 1993)
Ricarda Octavia HUCH (1883 - 1937)

Elizabeth LANGASSER (1899 - 1950)

Berta LASK (1878 - 1967)
Lola LANDAU (1892 - 1990)
Mechtilde LICHNOWSKY (1879 - 1958)

Thekla LINGEN

Lya MARA
Elisabeth MEINHARD ??

Elizabeth PAULSEN

Else LASKER SCHULER (1869 - 1965)
Hilde STIELER-MEYER (1879 - 1965)
Nell WALDEN (1887 - 1975) 

HOLLAND

Agnita FEIS

Henriette ROLAND HOLST (1869 - 1952)

Augusta PEAUX (1859 - 1944)

Giza RITSCHL (1869 - 1942)

Nine van der SCHAAF (1882 - 1973)

Margo SHARTEN-ANTINK

Helene SWARTH (1859 - 1941)

Jacqueline van der WAALS (1868 - 1922)

INDIA

Sarojini NAIDU (1879 - 1949)

Nalini Bala DEVI (1898 - 19770

IRELAND

Eva GORE BOOTH

Kathleen KNOX

May O'ROURKE (Became Secretary to Thomas Hardy in 1923)

Dora SIGERSON SHORTER (1866 - 1918)

Katharine TYNAN (1861 - 1931)

Helen WADDELL

ITALY

Ada NEGRI (1870 – 1945)

Amalia GUGLIELMINETTI (1881 – 1941)

JAPAN

Akiko YOSANO (1878 - 1942)

NEWFOUNDLAND

Georgiana COOPER

Rose M. GREENE

P. Florence MILLER

Marie E. WAY

NEW ZEALAND

Mary Ursula BETHELL (1874 - 19450

Eileen DUGGAN (1894 - 1972)

Katherine MANSFIELD (1888 - 1923)

POLAND

Maria PAWLIKOWSKA-JASNORZEWSKA (24.11.1891 Krakow – 09.07 1945 Manchester)

PORTUGAL

Fernanda de CASTRO

Florbela ESPANCA

Marta MESQUITA DE CAMARA

Virginia VITORINO

ROMANIAN

Stilia CAZIMIR (1894 - 1967)
Maria CUNTAN ?
Elena FARAGO (1878 - 1954)
Natalia NEGRU (1862 - 1962)
Izabela SADOVEANU-EVAN (24.02.1870 – 06.08.1941)

Elena VACARESCU (21.9.1864 Bucharest – 17.02.1947 Paris)

RUSSIA

Anna AKHMATOVA (1889 -1966 from the Ukraine)

Marina TSVETAEVA

SERBIA

Jelena Spiridonovie Savic (1890 – 974)

SOUTH AFRICAN

Edith L.M. KING (1871 - 1962)

SWEDEN

Elsa BESKOW (1874 – 1953)


SWITZERLAND

Francisa STOCKLIN (1894 - 1931)


"LOST SHEEP"

Emily ORR
Muriel Elsie GRAHAM

Issues for Discussion

While researching background information for the exhibitions, I came across a wondrous website - www.oldmagazinearticles.com run by Matt Jacobsen.  There I found an account by American writer Frederick James Gregg, which suggested with regard to the First World War, only four writers ‘produced things which will last as literature after the tumult and the fighting are over…” These were:  Howard Copeland writing in the New York Times on 5^th December 1914 – “Germany Suffering from a Morbid Complex”;  Mildred Aldrich’s letters printed in “The Atlantic” 1915 – “The Little House on the Marne”;  Cardinal Mercier, - “The Great Belgian Pastoral” and W.F. Bailey – papers on Croatia, Silicia and Poland, published “in English reviews and quarterlies”.

These works, and only these, in Gregg’s opinion, were “…a sincere, lasting and graphic literary achievement… All the rest, the thousand and one war books, the magazines full of war articles, may serve a useful purpose, argumentative or informing, but they will be forgotten and disappear, like the shells that litter the ground in Flanders, or like the oily bubbles of the German submarines.”  Gregg, Frederick James, “Good and Bad Writing about the War” in “Vanity Fair”, November 1915, p. 67 from OldMagazineArticles.com, 09.04.2013.

Similarly critical of using war as a topic for writing verse was W.B. Yeats, who, when he chose poems for his “Oxford Book of Modern Verse, left out poems by Wilfred Owen, explaining the reasons for his decision “in a … letter to Lady Dorothy Wellesley:

“When I excluded Wilfred Owen, who I consider unworthy of the poets’ corner of a country newspaper, I did not know I was excluding a revered sandwich-board man of the revolution and that somebody has put his worst and most famous poem in a glass-case in the British Museum – however if I had known it I would have excluded him just the same.  He is all blood, dirt and sucked sugar stick (look at the selection in Faber’s Anthology – he calls poets ‘bards’, a girl a ‘maid’ and talks about ‘Titanic wars’).”  Black, E.L., Ed. “1914-18 in Poetry:  An anthology selected & edited by E.L. Black.- (Hodder and Stoughton, Sevenoaks, Kent, 1982) pp. 14 – 15.

In the general introduction to his anthology of First World War poetry, Black goes on to describe the criticisms of Professor John H. Johnston of the Unviersity of West Virginia who wrote “The English Poetry of the First World War”.

However, Black feels these arguments are ‘unfair’ because of the terrible conditions in which many of the young soldier poets who were killed during the First World War wrote their poems – “all they could do was to scribble lyrics while cowering in shell-holes or enjoying their brief periods of leave.” (Black, p. 15).   It could therefore reasonably be argued that the most meaningful poetry written during any conflict needs to be written by those who had first hand experience of the situation.

Or does it?

This work seeks to show this is not necessarily the case through the poems of a few of the women who were alive at the time of the First World War, some of whom did indeed see the First World War from very close quarters as nurses, ambulance drivers, entertainers of the troops, etc.

It is proving quite difficult to find all of the women who wrote poetry at the time of the Great War.   At that time it was the fashion to ‘self publish’ through the medium of ‘pamphlets’, many of which will have inevitably been lost in the mists of time.   Can these writers be considered to be 'serious' poets?  George Bruce would surely have entered into this discussion - see Bruce's opinions in the review of one of his volumes of poetry written by Dr. Ian Olson in a previous blog.

In her truly excellent book, “The Nation’s Cause:  French, English and German Poetry of the First World War” (Routledge, Abingdon, Oxon., 2011), Elizabeth Marsland mentions Birmingham poet Elsie Mewis, who raised £120 (that would be equivalent to £24,000 in 2013) by selling just such a poem in aid of our troops and Belgian refugees (Marsland, p. 90), printing 20,000 copies and selling them for 1d (one penny – which would be worth approximately 84p in 2013) each.   What an achievement.

Would it be fair to leave these, self published poets out of my project simply because their poems as Marsland says are examples of ‘folk poetry’? (Marsland, pp 90 - 91). I don’t think so.  What do you think?

I look forward to hearing your comments.

To my friends in Newfoundland and in Scotland

I should like to thank Patrick O'Reilly and Lisa Banks from The Atlantic Poets' Archive, Canada for their wonderful help in finding me some women poets from Newfoundland.  I shall enjoy finding out about these new (to me) poets.

To my shame I had not realised until very recently that Newfoundland was separate from Canada during both the First and Second World Wars.   I have now put that right and will include in my notes a reference to Newfoundland's tremendous contribution to The First World War.

And thanks also to Lizzie MacGregor, who is Assistant Librarian at the Scottish Poetry Library in Edinburgh.  Lizzie has found me three Scottish poets I had not previously found, which is wonderful.

So my dear friends, the list grows daily.   I spent a happy hour over tea this beautiful sunny afternoon searching out some more poets for the list.

At some stage soon I shall have to stop searching and continue preparing panels for the Exhibition at the Ace Centre in Nelson, East Lancashire, UK from 15th August - 3rd September 2013 but it is quite difficult because I find the research so fascinating.

As many of you will know, if you have someone in mind you think deserves a mention but she is not a poet, I have a section entitled "Inspirational Women of World War One".  

Dr. Ian Olson's Review of the poet George Bruce's book "Pursuit: Poems 1996 - 1998"

Following my letter that "The Times" kindly printed on 7th May 2013, Dr. Ian Olson from Aberdeen contacted me with some advice regarding poets from Scotland.   As I am including poets from other countries and poetry in languages other than English, I thought I would like to find examples of Scottish, Irish and Welsh poems as well.  

Dr. Olson sent me a copy of his review of the poet George Bruce's volume of poems "Pursuit:  Poems 1996 - 1998".  He has given me permission to share part of this with you.  Thank you very much Dr. Olson.

I found this particularly helpful and inspirational:

 "Robert Graves was of the opinion that poetry was gifted to you by your Muse (the White Goddess), and that you had to wait for her graciousness. Then it was your job as a poet or bard to shape and chisel it into final form with all the skill and craft you had learned, no matter how many days or years that took. The early Welsh and Gaels, the Angles and Saxons, for example, would have recognised this approach immediately. 

George Bruce will have none of it. If a theme is suggested to you, whatever the source, it is your task as a poet to produce a workmanlike response. Most of us would worry that this would at best result in verses more suitable for the burgeoning greeting cards industry, but he sees no reason at all why this should be so. When he travels and talks, lectures and gives seminars on both sides of the Atlantic he exhorts younger writers in a thoroughly modern manner - “Just do it”, he says. He sees no reason why this should not be everyone’s method - no bardic mystique, no gracious lady in Grecian nightie plus lyre, just a proper job of work and no nonsense. As a result, perhaps, his poetry isn’t clever or contrived or mysterious - what you see is what you get. But the converse is that he is obliged to provide passion and commitment, skill and care, to enable his carvings to be worthy of life’s cathedral."

‘Pursuit: Poems 1996-1998. By George Bruce’ [Review] NorthWords magazine No. 20/21(1999), 69-71.    Ian A. Olson

http://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/poetry/poets/george-bruce

Fleetwood Museum

I spent a happy hour looking round Fleetwood Museum yesterday gathering information about Fleetwood trawlers, some of which were taken into the service of the Admiralty in the First World War for mine searching tasks.  Lynn Asghar the Museum Manager and her Team do a terrific job and work very hard indeed.  The museum is a wonderful place and a fine tribute to Fleetwood's maritime history.

The museum has a very nice cafe and we tried the toasted sandwiches, which were delicious - the cakes looked lovely too.  In the cafe you will find the Fleetwood Grammar School stained glass Memorial window (see left), designed by senior art mistress at the school - Mrs A. Haworth.

When the Grammar School was closed, the window was taken into the collections of Lancashire County Museums Service and kept in storage until the new Coffee House at Fleetwood Museum was opened.  Fleetwood Museum Trust held a successful appeal for funding so the window could be enjoyed by all.

I love going to Fleetwood - get a feel that the ghost of Wilfred Owen lingers there.  

Wilfred Owen was stationed in Fleetwood for a few weeks in November/December 1916 while at the Gunnery School, the HQ of which was at the North Euston Hotel.  The firing range was where Fleetwood Golf Links is now situated and there is a very good booklet available from the Golf Club explaining its history during WW1.

Fleetwood Museum, Queen's Terrace, Fleetwood, Lancashire, GY7 6BT.  Tel.:  01253 876621
www.fleetwoodmuseum.co.uk

Centenary News website

Thank you very much to Daniel Barry, a Researcher at Centenary News for putting a posting on their site about the Female Poets of the First World War and Inspirational Women of World War One Exhibition project:

http://www.centenarynews.com/article/?id=898

and thank you to Mr Bishop for suggesting I contact Centenary News.

Thanks also to Chris at Broughton House, Salford, which was one of the very first care homes for wounded soldiers during the First World War as 'The East Lancashire Homes for Disabled Sailors and Soldiers', opened in 1916 - www.bhch.co.uk