Elsie Spence Rae (1898 - 1973) – Scottish poet

With many thanks to Dr Alison T. McCall, independent researcher, Kintore, for reminding me that I had not yet researched Elsie.  Dr. McCall has kindly sent me scans of some of Elsie's poems from her collection of WW1 poems.

Elsie was born in Banff, in the Banff and Buchan area of Aberdeenshire, Scotland, on 16th November 1898. Her parents were John S. Rae, a grocer, and his wife Annie.  Elsie had the following siblings:  Annie, Kathy, John, William and Maggie.  Elsie studied at Aberdeen University and during the First World War, she served with the Voluntary Aid Detachment as a nurse.

On 5th April 1921, Elsie married Robert Wilson.

Alison says: “Elsie Rae's poems are a mixture of Doric (broad Scots) and English.” 

Elsie’s WW1 poetry collection is “Private John M’Pherson and other war poems” (Aberdeen Daily Journal Office, Wyllie, Aberdeen, 1918)

Catherine W. Reilly “English Poetry of the First World War:  A Bibliography” (St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1978) p. 260.  Poems from Elsie’s WW1 collection kindly supplied by Alison McCall

Sources:  Find my Past
Aberdeen University Memorial Roll 1914  - 1918)
Catherine W. Reilly “English Poetry of the First World War:  A Bibliography” (St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1978) p. 260.  Information about Elsie's marriage supplied by Dr. McCall.

Remembering WW1 female poet Nadja (1895 - 1934) on the 84th anniversary of her death

Today (Wednesday, 3rd October 2018) marks the 84th anniversary of the death of WW1 poet Nadja. 

Born Louisa Nadia Green in Hampstead, UK in 1893, during the First World War, Nadja published three volumes of her poetry to be sold in aid of St. Dunstan's Home for Blind Soldiers (now called Blind Veterans UK) and The Star and Garter Home for Disabled Soldiers. 

In 1922, Nadja married Italian Marquess Pier Malacrida de Saint-August. She died in a motor car accident on her way home to London on Wednesday, 3rd October 1934.

Nadja is included in "Female Poets of the First World War: Volume Two" on pages 34 - 37).

Nadja's WW1 poetry collections were:  

 "Love and War: poems by Nadja" (Humphreys, London 1915)

"For Empire, and other poems" (Humphreys, London, 1916); and 

"The full heart: poems by Nadja" (Humphreys, London, 1919).

With thanks to Professor Brian Murdoch of Stirling University for bringing the work of Nadja to my attention.

In memory of Nadja, we planted a Malmaison Rose which was her favourite flower.

You can find out more about Nadja, who was a member of the 'social elite' in the UK during the 1920s and 1930s here:  https://worldofnadjamalacrida.blogspot.com/

Beatrice Mary Smylie (1871 - 1961) - British

"A poet not on your list - Beatrice Mary Smylie" - from Felix via Twitter.  Beatrice was married to the poet Robert Smylie who was killed during the Somme Offensive on 14th July 1916.  Robert was featured in the 2016 exhibition of Poets, Writers and More of the Somme, 1916.  There is a book of that exhibition - Robert is on pages 29 - 30.

Beatrice was born in 1871 in Weston-Super-Mare in Somerset. She died in Cambridge on 31st March 1961 and was buried in Swaffam Bulbeck Cemetery, grave reference: 98032325.

Felix kindly sent me a scan of some of her poems, which I hope to type out and share with you shortly.

Many thanks, Felix.

Virginie Élodie Marie Thérèse Demont-Breton known as Virginie Demont-Breton (1859 – 1935) – French artist and poet

Virginie Élodie Marie Thérèse Breton was born on 26th  July 1859 at Courrières, a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in the Hauts-de-France region of France.   Virginie’s father was the artist Jules Breton (1827-1906), and her uncle was the artist Emile Breton.

Beginning in 1879, Virginie exhibited examples of her work in Paris. She was awarded a gold medal at the Universal Exhibition held in Amsterdam in 1883. In 1880, Virginie married the artist Adrien Demont en 1880 and they had three daughters - Louise, Adrienne et Éliane.
 In 1890, Virginie and her husband moved to Wissant, a small village on the ‘Opal Coast’ in France between Capes Blanc-Nez and Gris-Nes.  The following year they had a house built by the Belgian architect Edmond De Vigne.

Virginie Demont-Breton joined the French Union of women artists and sculptors in 1883 and was President of the Union from 1895 until 1901.  In 1894, Virginie was awarded a Legion d’honneur.

Virginie died in Paris on 10th January 1935.

See some of Virginie’s beautiful paintings here:
https://iamachild.wordpress.com/2009/04/09/virginie-demont-breton-1859-1935-french/

Virginie’s poetry collection, “Tendresses dans la tourmente: 1914-1919 poésies”, was published by Alphonse Lemerre, Paris, 1920.  I am trying to find some of Virginie’s poems.  If anyone can help, please get in touch.

With thanks to Régine Verguier for finding Virginie for me

Virginie's most famous painting "L'Homme est en mer" - English translation 'Her husband is away at sea' evokes for me the sentiments of women during the Fist World War.

Message of encouragement from the Women's History Community

"Dear Lucy London and Female War Poets

Thank you for submitting your entry to the WHN Community Prize.  I am sorry to tell you that you were not one of our prize winners, but that the judges were impressed by your work to uncover previously forgotten / unacknowledged/ unpublished women poets. One of our judges commented that this was a really interesting topic and that on a very small budget, you had promoted and shared an area of women’s history that was not well known. Keep up the good work. 

All the very best

Professor Maggie Andrews on behalf of the Women's History Community History Prize Panel"

Thank you Professor Andrews and the Women's History Community History Prize Panel - my main aim is to spread the word about the amazing women of WW1.

Celia, Lady Congreve (1867 – 1952) – British poet and WW1 nurse

Celia was born in India on 24th April 1867. She was baptised Cecelia Henrietta Dolores Blount la Touche on 3rd November 1867, in Rajkot, India, where her father was based.  Celia’s parents were Charles William Blount La Touche, a British Army Officer, and his wife, Rosa Wilhelmina, nee Müller.

On 3rd June 1890, Celia married Walter Norris Congreve VC KCB MVO (who was later knighted and became General Sir Walter Congreve), known as “Squibs” or “Old Concrete”, at St. Jude’s Church in Kensington, London, UK. Walter was an Army officer who served in the British Army during the Second Boer War and the First World War.  After WW1, he was General Officer Commanding the Egyptian Expeditionary Force between 1919 and 1923, Commander-in-Chief Southern Command between 1923 and 1924 and Governor of Malta from 1924 until his death in Malta in 1927.

Celia and Walter had the following children: William La Touche Congreve, VC, DSO, MC, Chevalier of the Legion d’Honneur, Rifle Brigade, b. 1891 on the Wirral - William, known as “Billy”, was killed in action in 1916; Commander Sir Geoffrey Cecil Congreve, DSO, RN., b. 19th July 1897, who was killed in WW2, and Major Arthur Christopher John Congreve, b. 1903, who also served in the Second World War. Geoffrey Cecil Congreve was created a baronet of Congreve in the County of Stafford in July 1927.

In 1891, Celia was registered as living in Burton Hall (later Burton Manor), Burton, near Neston, Wirral, UK.

During the First World War, Celia served as a nurse in Belgium and France and was awarded the Reconnaissance Française and the Belgian Medaille de la Reine Elisabeth for being one of the last nurses to leave Antwerp with the wounded in 1914. She was also awarded the French Croix de Guerre for her bravery as a nurse at Rosières-aux-Salines, near Nancy, France.  The hospital was shelled and bombed by aircraft in 1918.

Celia died in Harrow on 4th September 1952.

Cellia’s WW1 poetry collection was “The Castle and other verses” (Humphreys, London, 1920).  One of her poems was included in “The Fiery Cross: An Anthology”, edited by Mabel C. Edwards and Mary Booth (Grant Richards, London, 1915) and, more recently, Dr Vivien Newman mentioned Celia in her book “Tumult and Tears:  The Story of The Great War through the eyes and lives of its women poets” (Pen & Sword History, Barnsley, Yorkshire, 2016).

“Lay your Head on the Earth's Breast” by Celia Congreve

Lay your head on the Earth's breast and you will hear her crying,

Sobbing, softly, hopelessly, for her sons who are dead and dying.

Splendid and gay they are marching still to the music of bugle and band,

Bravest and best of my beautiful sons they are going from every land.

Are there none who will stay of all my sons? Must you all go?

Yes; all that you love, the pride of your eyes, Mother, you'd have it so.

Mangled and torn they lie in heaps, broken, dying and dead.

O scarlet blood of my splendid sons, you have dyed my green fields red.

What can I do for you, O my sons? My last, last gift is small,

A few poor sods to cover your heads and a scatter of snow o'er all.

Lay your head on the Earth's breast and you will hear her crying,

Grieving, softly, hopelessly, for her sons who are dead and dying.

Celia Congreve.  “Country Life”

From “The Fiery Cross” p. 92

Sources:  Catherine W. Reilly “English Poetry of the First World War:  A Bibliography” (St. Martin’s Press, New York, 1978).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burton_Manor
http://www.vconline.org.uk/william-l-congreve-vc/4586228117
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=vZ-aBQAAQBAJ&pg=PT201&lpg=PT201&dq=celia+congreve&source=bl&ots=XE0rb4Fq1o&sig=5pV-UPGpv_eI2Gt-L556IJUcuHg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjkzO2jxsvbAhVLKsAKHU3XBA44ChDoAQhbMAk#v=onepage&q=celia%20congreve&f=false

https://allpoetry.com/Lay-your-Head-on-the-Earth's-Breast

Ella Higginson (1862 – 1940 ) - American

I find it very exciting to discover a WW1 female poet I have not heard of  and Ella Rhodes Higginson falls into that category.

With grateful thanks to Marielle Stockton, Research Specialist in the Library of American Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington, USA, for her posts on Twitter, that led to the discovery of Ella Higginson and to an exchange of e-mails, to Dr. Laura Laffrado, Professor of English at Western Washington University and the Director of the Ella Higginson Recovery Project and to Debbie Cameron for reminding me to look at Twitter.

Ella was born in Kansas, the youngest of six children. Her parents were Charles Reeve Rhoads and his wife, Mary A. Rhoads.  Ella began writing poetry at an early age and had one of her poems – “Dreams of the Past” -  published in  “The Oregon City” newspaper in 1875.

Ella Rhoads married Russell Carden Higginson. He came from a prominent family on the east coast that had established themselves during America's colonial period. Russell Carden Higginson is a cousin of Thomas Wentworth Higginson, the editor of Emily Dickinson's poetry. Ella is therefore relatec by marriage to the poet Mary Thacker Higginson, who was the wife of Thomas Wentworth Higginson.

During the First World War, Ella was a volunteer with the Bellingham Branchy of the American Red Cross and received the Red Cross Medal for her service.

“Song of the Evergreen Pine” is a poem that the Washington State Federation of Women’s Clubs asked Higginson to write for their 1915 convention. This poem appears in Ella Higginson: A Tribute, a slim volume published after her death in 1940 in which she selected many of the poems that would appear in it. This poem appears in no other books of Higginson’s.

The rivers to the ocean flow,
The sunsets burn and flee,
The stars come to the darkling sky,
The violets to the lea;
But I stay in one lone sweet place
And dream of the blue sea.

The harebell blooms and is away,
The salmon spawns and dies;
The oriole nests and is on the wing,
Calling her sweet good-bys;
But I, when blossoms and fruit are gone,
Yearn, steadfast to the skies.

I am a prayer and a praise,
A sermon and a song;
My leaf-chords thrill at the wind’s will
To nocturnes deep and strong;
Or to the sea’s far lyric melodies
They echo and prolong

When April flashing up the hill
Freshens my green attire,
I light my candle tall and pale
With holy scarlet fire—
And straight their incense mounts to God,
Pure as a soul’s desire.

My branches poise upon the air,
Like soft and living wings;
My trembling leaves the wind awakes
To a harp of emerald strings—
Or through the violet silences
A golden vesper sings.

I am a symbol and a sign . . .
Thro’ blue or rose or gray;
Thro’ rain and dark; thro’ storms of night,
Thro’ opaline lights of day—
Slowly and patiently up to God
I make my beautiful way.

“For Honor and for God” was printed on the front page of the Bellingham Herald on September 18, 1917. It was also published in a handbook of the Bellingham State Normal School, one of the state colleges for training teachers. This poem appears in no books of Higginson’s.

America, stand up! The time has come
      To blow shrill bugle-calls throughout this land.
      Drop the white flag of peace from they're firm hand,
And bid the long, wild rattle of the drum
Quicken the blood of men from shore to shore.
      Nations, on our swords gathered is no rust!
      Peace if it may be; red war if it must!
For we love peace—but we love honor more.


Fling out again o’er every battle-ship
      That old white flag with the inspired device—
      The pine-tree springing from the lowly sod
Thrilled big with prayer to its trembling tip!
      Then will the old fire melt these veins of ice,
      And we will fight—for honor and for God!

“God Has Not Spoken Yet” appears in the American Reveille in April of 1910, but in Ella Higginson: A Tribute the poem is reprinted and there it says that it was written in April of 1918. I believe that the poem was perhaps revised by Higginson and printed in a newspaper or periodical in 1918. This poem appears in no other books of Higginson’s.

God has not spoken yet!
The world’s dread horror struggles to its close;
Where France’s slopes today with blood are wet,
Next year will bloom the lily and the rose.

God has not spoken yet!
But when God speaks—whose side will God be on?
Will he the Invaders’ crimes forget,
Give night and shame, or Liberty and dawn?

God has not spoken yet—
But courage must not fail, nor faith grow weak;
To work! for Freedom’s sun must never set!
God has not spoken—but God will speak!

[under poem in type: “(Hohenzollern changed to Invaders.)—E. H.”] 

An interview with Dr. Laura Laffrado https://www.c-span.org/video/?316868-1/ella-higginson-pacific-northwest

Follow Marielle’s tweets here https://twitter.com/HigginsonBlog

The Photograph of Ella taken during the 1890s is from her Wikipedia entry (27 May 2018).