Chapter 6 Concerning Women

Chapter 6 Concerning Womeni His name was constantly in the popular newspapers, giving his wayward opinions on any subject about which he was consulted. Evelyn Waugh A Little Learning (1964) In the summer of 1920 St Jude’s Church commissioned the artist Walter Percival Starmer (1877 – 1961) to paint a series of murals in the Lady Chapel as a permanent memorial to those who died in the war.ii The idea of decorating the church with paintings probably came from Henrietta Barnett herself, and through the influence of the Scottish visionary and social reformer Patrick Geddes, who promoted the mural as the most efficient medium of artistic communication and instruction. Larger than life paintings made specially for the great spaces within public buildings, rather than on “little panels... to flap idly upon rich men’s walls”iii, and treating the great themes of history, civilization and faith, had a power to lift the spirit and inform the mind of the viewer. Mural painting was likened to opera, and the muralist was “not only a painter, but a poet, historian, dramatist, philosopher”iv. Geddes was one of the promoters of the 1912 Exhibition of Designs for Mural Painting and for the Decoration of Schools and other Buildings held at Crosby Hall in Chelsea. As well as illustrations of designs already executed, for example by Walter Crane, Frederick Shields and Ford Madox Brown, the exhibition included a competition, sponsored by the Contemporary Art Society, for the decoration of spaces within some recent buildings, including the Lady Chapel of the parish church in Henrietta Barnett’s garden suburb. The Exhibition Catalogue “pointed out the existence of other available spaces should be borne in mind, as they would ultimately be filled with paintings”. The St Jude’s Parish Paper reported that a dozen or so entries had been received, but they were, protested a contributor, “poor in quality, design and work, being for the most part the work of amateurs and ladies”v. Nevertheless, the prize was awarded to Miss Mabel Esplin (1874-1921), a recent graduate of the Slade School of Fine Art and the Central School of Arts and Design, who at the time was engaged on what proved to be the only major project of her career, a series of windows for All Saints’ Anglican Cathedral in Khartoum. A serious mental breakdown ended her working life in 1916. There is no record of her design even being considered by St Jude’s church. Although nothing appeared on the walls, the description of the Lady Chapel competition would seem to support the later claim by Starmer that St Jude’s had actually been designed with murals in mindvi, as well as the 1923 History of the church which refers, albeit retrospectively, to the “immense wall space, white and bare, calling out for mural painting and artistic treatment”vii. A protest against decoration would also seem to confirm this: It is understood that the authorities at S. Jude’s are disposed to offer part of the walls for an experiment in wall-painting; but would that not involve a rather serious risk? The best of a school wall is that you can paint and wash out as much as you like. Not so with a fine virgin brick interior such as this of Mr. Lutyens’.viii Bourchier himself was probably more of a mind with the comments of the Church Times on the occasion of the dedication of the tower and spire in 1913: The capacious church is not yet finished, and its interior is perhaps a little bare. But it is the kind of building that lends itself readily to decoration, and it is easy to imagine a very beautiful interior when all is completeix. Bourchier says he met the artist at Arras in 1918 when he was visiting the Western Frontx. Starmer was a volunteer with the YMCA, and some of his pictures were later used to illustrate the history of the Association’s work in the war zonexi. Writing in the February 1921 edition of the St Jude’s Parish Paper, Starmer says he has taken as a general scheme for the Lady Chapel The Women of the Bible. The choice of illustrations of Biblical women generally, rather than scenes from the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary, was not a surprising one for the Lady Chapel of an Anglican church, but was perhaps rather unexpected for a scheme dedicated “to the glory of God, and in memory of the brave and gallant men of this Church who gave their lives in the Great War”. Although the Chapel contains a list of the fallen (between images of Martha and Mary and beneath a foundation stone by Eric Gill), it is the decoration of the Chapel as a whole that is the war memorial. This was made particularly clear in an apparent revision to the original scheme whereby the west dome (originally to be filled with angels) was packed with portraits illustrative of various types of women who have laboured and suffered in various spheres for the furtherance of the Kingdom of God, as witnesses for right as they conceived it, and for the extension of righteousness among men. The intention is to suggest the continuity of efforts towards this end through the Christian ages. Starmer says they are mainly types with the odd well-known figure for emphasis, but the majority are in fact portraits of identifiable Christian heroines and saints. The more recently deceased women include the antivivisectionist and suffragist Frances Power Cobbe (d. 1904), the social reformer and women’s right campaigner Josephine Butler (d.1906), Angela Burdett-Coutts (d.1906), philanthropist and supporter of animal causes, the executed nurse Edith Cavell (d. 1915), Elsie Inglis (d. 1917) a Scottish doctor and suffragist who had established all-women medical units to work with the Allied forces and served in Serbia (where she was captured) and Russia, and Agnes Weston (d. 1918) who had dedicated her life to the welfare of the men of the Royal Navy. Particular prominence is given to the portrait of Joan of Arc that immediately confronts the visitor entering the chapel. Although the English had been responsible for Joan’s trial and execution as a heretic, and her image had been deployed by the Catholic League in the sixteenth century Wars of Religion against Protestants, she had more recently became a symbol of resistance to German militarism and outrages against women and children. Joan’s presence in St Jude’s, however, probably owes more to her role as an inspiration and symbol for the women’s suffrage movement in England. From at least the turn of the century she had regularly appeared, not just on posters and placards, but in person at suffragist events and demonstrations when a participant would be detailed to put on armour and take up the sword in the battle for the vote. She had led the Women’s Coronation Procession through the streets of London on 17 June 1911, a week before the coronation of George V. And on 3 June 1913, Emily Wilding Davison saluted the centrepiece statue of Joan of Arc at the Women’s Suffrage and Political Union summer fair with Joan’s own last words Fight on, and God will give victory. The same words would appear on Emily’s grave a few days later following her death beneath the king’s horse at the Derby. Moreover, as a leader of men Joan would have had a particular appeal to the chairman of the St Jude’s war memorial ladies’ fund-raising committee, Bourchier’s wartime companion, Mabel St Clair Stobart who was almost certainly responsible for the selection of the eminent women for the dome. Her committee had been formed just as the chapel was nearing completion, so that it could be said the task of raising the £1500 costs would be entirely discharged by the women of the congregation . . . because the Lady-chapel stands for the ennobling of womanhood; and because the beautifying of this portion of the Church is to form our permanent memorial to the gallant dead, and all through the cruel years of war it was upon the women of the Empire that the heaviest burden fellxii. At the time of the painting (and from 1918) only certain women over 30 had the vote; it would not be until 1928 that it was granted on the same terms as men, to all over 21. The Lady Chapel dome then became much more than a war memorial. It was a celebration of the contribution of women to the church and nation, but also part of the continuing campaign for universal adult suffrage. Bourchier’s own opinions on the role of women in society and the church were not quite so advanced as Mrs Stobart’s. He originally opposed women’s suffrage. At a meeting of their Golders Green and Hampstead Garden Suburb branch in July 1912 he expressed his entire sympathy with the aims of the National League for Opposing Woman Suffragexiii. He spoke against Lady Frances Balfour, the aristocratic suffragist and President of the National Society for Women's Suffrage, the first national group in Britain to campaign for women's right to vote, in a debate on the subject in Highgate in November 1912. However, after attending a(nother) meeting of the Anti-Suffrage Leaguexiv in his own parish later that same month, he announced that “since so altogether conflicting was the evidence adduced alike by the pro and the anti advocates, he had decided to dissociate himself from either supporting or opposing the movement”. In future he would “adopt an attitude of strict neutralityxv. Perhaps it is revealing that Bourchier thought the issue was one of evidence rather than rights. This was certainly the position he would take against Mrs Stobart in the debate about women’s ministry in the church. He expressed his neutrality when chairing a debate for the parish young men’s society in October 1913: That the franchise be extended to women. He wrote: “Confirmed bachelors – like the chairman – refused to contemplate that gentlest of all creation - woman - being hauled into the vortex of politics, and the motion was defeated in no uncertain fashion”xvi. The Suburb had had its own Womens’ Franchise Society from early days. In June 1911 they took part in the “brilliant pageant” along the Embankment organised by the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), and were “perhaps the most vigorous and compact division of the great army”. “The Garden Suburb got at least its full share of attention and comment from the vast concourse of spectators, amongst which, it is more than suspected, were concealed many hundreds of suburbans who should have been ranged behind the banner.”xvii The Suburb also had a branch of the non-violent Women’s Freedom League, which had split from the WSPU in 1907 and advocated non-violent forms of protest. Surprisingly the Parish Paper makes no mention of arson attacks by militant suffragettes on the neighbouring Institute, Free Church, and two unoccupied local houses in 1913. Many such attacks were taking place at the time as Emmeline Pankhurst the leader of the WSPU, which promoted such tactics, was then on trial for conspiracy to bomb the country home of David Lloyd-George, the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Suffragette arson in early March seriously damaged a modest building that had some local historical interest and endangered the lives of the caretaker and his family who lived there. This was the wooden hut where the first church services had been held in 1908-1909, and which in the earliest days of Hampstead Garden Suburb had been the only public building available for social and educational gatherings and meetings. It had later been moved to Central Square to serve as an annexe to Lutyens’s Institute. The (Hampstead Garden Suburb) Record reported: The Vicar’s hospitable doors were opened wide to receive the salvage; including the young man of seven from the Organising Secretary’s flat [in the main building], whose special request before turning over to sleep in the Vicar’s spare room was, ‘See that my whip is safe’; and a bamboo table and a tin of cocoa which some kind friend transported from the top floor to the vicarage dining room.xviii Scotland Yard warned Bourchier and the Minister of the Free Church that an outrage was expected, and on Wednesday 2 April 1913 the latter’s building was attacked and narrowly escaped destruction. The fire was discovered in the afternoon by a young man who had gone to practise on the organ, “but owing to the fact that the fire had been started in a cupboard in the vestry, in which was a lead water pipe, the heat of the fire melted the pipe, and the water itself helped put the fire out”xix. Given the proximity of the two churches it is perhaps surprising that St Jude’s was not also fired. It is possible that St Jude’s was simply occupied at the time, or the ever-burning sanctuary lights visible through the clear windows gave the impression that it wasxx. In May 1914 there were complaints about suffragettes who attend St Jude’s distributing handbills at the church doors. Bourchier responded that “a sense of fairness demands that the Church, in its official capacity, should remain neutral”, and its officers have no responsibility for what happens outside the building. A letter the following week from the secretary of the local Church League for Women's Suffrage pointed out that the handbills were in fact notices for the meetings of suffragist religious leagues (including Catholic and Jewish groups). The Church League had been founded in 1909 to campaign for the vote, but also to emphasize the deep religious significance of the women’s movement. Although it said its methods were devotional and educational it had just refused (in February 1914) to condemn the militancy of the WSPUxxi. Before the more serious discussion on women in ministry Bourchier had reprinted in 1913 a gentle hint given to women communicants in the Church and Parish Paper of All Saints’, Margaret Street on the wearing of hats to communion. The Vicar is very grateful to the ladies who have adopted his suggestion that black lace veils should be worn at the time of communion instead of hats. He would like to see this practice largely increased. And he must beg that no lady who reads this paragraph will again present herself at the Altar in a hat resembling a parasol, or in that other and even more repulsive shape which resembles a bee-hive, or an inverted large and shallow basinxxii. He returned to the subject in 1917. To see so many at Communion on Sunday was, as ever, a great joy. But oh! Dear lady-communicants, those HATS!!! If you only realised the agony they cause us clergy, and the sweat! Constantly we can see neither hands nor lips, and the greatest joy of our priesthood is utterly spoiled by the nervous tension that trying to dodge these excrescences involves. Please, why not the simplest headgear for the early service, or, best of all, the mantilla? At the later services wear what you willxxiii. He was not expressing a personal preference or eccentricity here. As early as March 1912 a parishioner had pointed out “in the Hampstead Garden Suburb … women are often seen hatless or with scarves, and … we acknowledge reason in dress rather than fashion”.xxiv The Suburb, in its early years, certainly attracted many who had advanced or unconventional views. Evelyn Waugh described it as “a community of unconventional bourgeois of artistic interests”xxv In July 1912 the Vicar said he “had recently overheard the booking-clerk at Golders-green say to his mate, “Ain’t they a queer lot at the Garden city! … He rather enjoyed it. In fact, he was very proud to be the queer Vicar of a queer people”.xxvi In August 1916 he attacked “misguided feminists who seek to lay sacrilegious hands even on the Ark of God” by suggesting that women might be permitted to preach in the Church of England: The proposal that women should be allowed to give addresses in church publicly is one that must be met with vigorous opposition by all who claim to be Catholics. It is clearly and distinctly contrary to Holy Scriptures and the tradition and custom of the whole Catholic Church. No bishop has any authority to permit such a practice; any provincial synod that attempted to sanction it would be acting ultra vires. It is impossible to look for any blessing resting upon so grave an infraction of Catholic practice. Still more grave is the suggestion, which is unhappily too well grounded, that this proposal would be the thin edge of the wedge for promoting the pestilent proposal that women should be appointed to the priesthood. Of course this is impossible – a woman being incapable of the grace of Holy Order. It is good to know that, so far as S. Jude-on-the-Hill is concerned, the Vicar has publicly stated, “You need have no misgivings. So long at any rate, as I am Incumbent such an innovation, subversive as I maintain it to be of all Catholic order and Christian custom, will never receive serious consideration.” Not indeed that I anticipate being asked. The bare idea, if I am not mistaken, is even more intolerable to right-minded women than it is to men. If the Bishops press it they will sign their own death-warrants – at least I hope soxxvii. A year later, however, he has certainly moderated his language, and perhaps even revised his views on the role of tradition and precedent in the church. In August 1917 he spoke in favour of “the claim of women to be given a greater measure of authority and position in the Church of Christ” in the programme of reconstruction after the War. Preaching on Luke 17.32 “Remember Lot’s wife” he said: Prejudice must be swept aside, and the whole question must be approached with an open mind. In things material women had already and for all time “made good.” The time had now come when their relationship to things spiritual must be revised. Not enough to dismiss the whole subject by quoting St Paul, for in one passage he says, “Let your women keep silence,” in another he says, “Every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head.” Obviously the injunctions to a local Church are not of universal application. Nor is it any argument to point out the absence of women from the Apostolate . . . The whole question needs thinking out afresh. I may well be that there are sound reasons why women should not preach. I am not competent to say. Conceivably no right is infringed, because no right exists. But my point is that if such reasons exist, they must be produced, and their cogency must be demonstrated. It is not sufficient to quote precedents and rules. The Church which, like Lot’s wife, only looks back is doomed. I do not undervalue tradition, but I have no use for the Church that dares not look forward and experiment . . . Argument not precedent is required. It is the spirit, not the letter, which counts . . . I am impatient of men’s attempts to explain to women her nature. In practical terms he seems to be speaking of the possibility of women ministering to other women, and performing appropriate pastoral duties under the guidance of male clergy. Of all the spectacles that I saw in France and Flanders, none impressed me more than the sight of church after church filled to overflowing with devout congregations calling upon God, with never a man within sight. Just a Godly woman kneeling in the centre leading the devotions of her own sex. Why should that sight not be witnessed at S. Jude-on-the-Hill? Again, in these days of war, with all our best parish priests at the Front, of what immense value would women be if ordained as Deaconesses and helping to carry on that essential work of parish visitation? If only I could have the help of two or three of such on this parish I would give a good deal.xxviii Bourchier was not here arguing for a new order of ministry. The first Deaconess in the Church of England (Elizabeth Ferard) had been licensed by the Bishop of London in 1862, the Order was recognised by the Lambeth Conference in 1897, and was securely established by the time Bourchier was writing. On 14 January 1919 a Congregational Debate was held at the Hampstead Garden Suburb Institute on the subject To What Extent (if at all) should Women be Admitted to the Public Ministry of the Church? The proposer was Mrs St Clair Stobart Greenhalgh. Mrs Stobart argued that there were four possible arguments for excluding women from the ministry of the church: that it would be contrary to scripture; that it would be contrary to the traditions of the Church; that women are incapable of the ministry; that they are not worthy of the ministry. The first she dismissed with many examples and by pointing out the Bible did not authorise women to work as munitions workers or surgeons and yet we did not prohibit these activities. The second with, In no other department of life would custom and tradition be urged as a argument, and was not this the reason why God’s Church had lost its hold on the modern world? The remaining two she challenged with Women are capable of intelligently reading Lessons, preaching, or looking after a parish [maybe she had Deaconesses in mind] and If a woman is unworthy of the ministry then she is spiritually incapable of the grace of God, an argument refuted by scripture. Bourchier came back with the classic Anglo-Catholic arguments: the Church could not be compared with any other organisation in the world; she was the appointed guardian of the truth of God, and Christ very expressly told the apostolate that they were nether to add nor to take away from the truth; the consent of the whole Church of Christ should be necessary to admit women to the ministry. If the Church of England committed itself to a woman ministry without consulting the other branches, 75 per cent of our people and the bulk of our clergy would be lost to it – and this would play into the hands of the Church of Rome which had long been trying to regain its domination over this country. He added, maybe for good measure, that few women would be able to make themselves heard in a big building like St Jude’s, and, in any case, the majority of women had no interest in being ordained. Mrs Stobart replied that the whole thing was absolutely hopeless, as the Vicar had approached the subject from an entirely different standpoint. She believed that God spoke to her soul as much as He spoke to the soul of a man. Women wanted to do this work because they felt the world was created on a dual system male and female. On the question being put, 21 voted in favour and 29 against.xxix The question of women’s ordination rose again in 1922. On 27 January Mrs Stobart hosted a meeting of the League of the Church Militant, an organization formed out of the Church’s League for Women’s Suffrage. Bourchier had been invited to attend and reported on the discussion in his Parish Paper of 3 February 1922 under the heading MILITANCY. He had heard nothing to change his mind, and repeated his earlier arguments rather more forcefully: Woman, and I am not speaking offensively, is by the will of God incapable of the Grace of Holy Order. The priesthood is a vocation not a profession. No use therefore to cite what women have done in other spheres. To cling to the historic Church of England and try to compel it to tamper with the faith and order that have characterized it for 1900 years is neither right nor honourable. He concluded “I am a bit apprehensive”. Mrs Stobart’s reply was published in the edition of 10 March 1922. She concentrated entirely on rebutting Bourchier’s assertion that the will of God had been reveled to Church Councils and this did not include the ordination of women. She pointed out if Church Council’s were infallible there will be no more boxing matches, no more festive evenings, no more tennis, no more Riviera for B.G.B. She concluded her ridicule by suggesting Bourchier should marry immediately because the 62nd Canon of the Council of Chalcedon prohibits clerics from singing at meals, and only by their vicar having a wife could his parishioners assure themselves the ordinance was being observed. Was she hinting here at knowledge of Bourchier’s sexual orientation?xxx She concluded “You and I have faced death together; we can neither of us be afraid to face any argument that has for its object the ascertainment of the Will of God.” No further discussion of the question was reported, but Mrs Stobart resigned from her post as a sidesman at the church shortly afterwards. Bourchier returned briefly to what he called the Woman Problem in a sermon on 4 August 1922 (it was part of a summer series on Difficult Problems – the others were on servants, prisons and drink). That she should possess the vote is bare justice. That she should be entitled to compete for a degree, or study law or medicine, is a right that nobody will wish to deny her. But there must surely be a point where we must cry Halt! Bourchier’s final thoughts come in an essay ‘Concerning Women’ in the collection Without Fear or Favourxxxi where he considers whether woman’s “intrusion into the sphere of male activities” will inevitably mean a loss of her ‘charm’. Much of the essay is devoted to considering the “vexed question of domestic service”, which he sees as “simply another illustration of the differentiation of function”. Woman has always had a special aptitude for domestic service and yet young women seem reluctant to fill a sphere so obviously their own. “Can it be due to the foolish spirit of independence? Servants have genuine grievances, but there is nothing dishonourable about their station. Mistresses should think of their servants as ‘friends’ and recognize that each party has duties towards the other. Looking beyond the home, the fact is that woman now has a permanent place in the world of work, and, though this might be resented by some, she has shown that “despite her contact with things mundane, she has forfeited none of her charm”. i I am grateful to the Reverend Colin Cartwright for reading and commenting on this chapter. ii See Alan Walker, Walter Starmer, Artist, 1877-1961 (London, St Jude-on-the-Hill, 2015) iii Patrick Geddes, Every Man his own Art Critic at the Manchester Exhibition (Manchester, Heywood, 1887) p27 iv Walter Crane, Of Decorative Painting and Design in William Morris (Preface), Arts and Crafts Essays (London, Rivington, 1893) v PP 14 June 1912 vi In a letter of 1919 to his fiancée Evelyn Marston Starmer wrote “the church was specially designed with great blank walls and ceilings in order that it may conform to the highest ideals of art by having the vast spaces covered by pictures illuminating the Bible, so that art and architecture so form one vast complete design and one perfect whole, as was done in the middle ages”. vii [W.Ward] History of S. Jude-on-the-Hill, (London, Doulton, 1923) p24 viii The Town Crier [Hampstead Garden Suburb] Vol 1 No 12 March 1912 ix Church Times 16 May 1913 x PP 11 June, 1920 xi Arthur K. Yapp The Romance of the Red Triangle (London, Hodder and Stoughton,1918) xii PP February 1921 xiii Anti-Suffrage Review August 1912, p195 I am grateful to the Reverend Colin Cartwright for this reference. xiv The Women's National Anti-Suffrage League was established in 1908. Its aims were to oppose women being granted the vote in parliamentary elections, although it did support their having votes in local government elections. It had actually become part of the National League for Opposing Woman Suffrage in 1910 but local branches might have continued with the original title. xv PP 22 November 1912 xvi PP 24 October 1912 xvii The Town Crier [Hampstead Garden Suburb] Vol 1 No 4 (July 1911) p53 xviii The [Hampstead Garden Suburb] Record Vol 1 No IX April 1913 xix Daily Chronicle 3 April 1913 The young organist presumably found the aftermath of a fire that had been lit during the previous night. xx There seems to be no evidence to support the local legend that the Free Church was mistaken for the real target of St Jude’s. The minister of the Free Church, the Reverend J. H. Rushbrooke, however, unlike Bourchier, was an unequivocal supporter of women’s suffrage. xxi PP 8 and 15 May 1914 xxii PP 18 April 1913 xxiii PP 1 June 1917 xxiv PP 1 March 1912 xxv Waugh (1964/2011) 55 xxvi PP 12 July 1912 xxvii PP 4 August 1916 xxviii PP 3 August 1917 xxix PP 24 January 1919 xxx ‘Boom Bagshaw’ in If Winter Comes is described as “intensely celibate”. xxxi Basil Graham Bourchier, Without Fear of Favour Being a Number of Frankly-Expressed Essays (London, Chapman and Hall, 1925)