Florence Balgarnie 1856 – 1928
Florence’s years of commitment to the BWTA were not without controversy, however. She was not afraid to speak out about injustice, even if it meant criticising close colleagues. Florence clashed with Lady Henry Somerset (BWTA President 1890-1903), following the visits of American activist Ida B Wells to Britain. Wells was campaigning against the brutality of lynching in the southern states of America. Florence did maintain her connections to the BWTA throughout this period and beyond, and went on to travel extensively across the world for the temperance cause.
She was also a member of the Pioneer Club for progressive ‘New Women’. This women’s only club was founded in London in 1892. Florence’s hobbies were said to include cycling, photography, gardening, ‘tramping’ and camping out.
Early Years
Florence was born in 1856 in Scarborough, the daughter of the Rev. Robert Balgarnie, a Congregational Minister in the town. She was educated in London and Germany and when she returned to Scarborough, she became Honourary Secretary of the University Extension Society and a member of the School Board. The University Extension Movement at Cambridge emerged around 1872, providing teaching for those unable to go to university. Florence was unable to go to Cambridge, so studied at home and passed the local examination. It was during these early years that Florence made her first public speeches. She became a supporter of women’s suffrage at 17 years old, addressing meetings in northern towns on the subject.
Lady Henry Somerset
From Scarborough, Florence went to London in around 1884. Here she became secretary of the executive panel of the Central Committee of the National Society for Women’s Suffrage. She spoke on women’s suffrage across England and Scotland. Florence held this role for six years, expanding her experience of parliamentary circles and public affairs.
Through her suffrage and temperance associations, Florence travelled to America in 1891 as a delegate to the Women’s Convention in Washington and the First Congress of the World Women’s Christian Temperance Unions (WWCTU). During this trip, Florence agreed to personally assist BWTA President, Lady Henry Somerset, in her meetings.
After her visit to America, Florence became a convinced prohibitionist and in 1894, she took a prominent part in the Great Veto Campaign of the North of England Temperance League.
Florence spent 12 months in America and Canada studying different social problems, returning in 1892. During her tour, she spent time studying police station management and its effect on women. On her return, she successfully highlighted the need for women Police Matrons for police stations before the Home Office and female factory inspectors.
She headed a deputation to Mr Asquith, MP, to ‘urge the degradation and demoralisation arising from leaving women prisoners in the hands of the police, and to plead for the appointment of police matrons.’ It is recorded that it was largely due to her efforts, that improvements were made in the Police Stations of London. Florence’s labours for the appointment of female factory inspectors was achieved in conjunction with Lady Aberdeen.
Florence wrote for a number of magazines and newspapers, including the London Echo, of which she was a correspondent for many years. The first article on the subject of police matrons appeared in its columns as a result of Florence’s personal investigations in Glasgow.
Suffrage and the Women’s Liberal Federation
Florence wrote at length in the press promoting women’s suffrage, total abstinence, Liberalism and University Extension. She was described as a staunch liberal and was a member of the Women’s Liberal Federation. In 1894, she spoke at their annual general meeting and by 1898, she was a member of the executive committee.
Alongside her role as secretary of the executive committee of the Central Committee of the National Society for Women’s Suffrage, Florence was an important speaker for the society. Early on in 1889, she was a delegate to the Women’s Rights Congress in Paris. She went on to represent the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies at the International Conference on Women’s Suffrage in Washington, USA in 1902.
In 1907, Florence took part in the ‘Mud March’, organised by the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies. Thousands of women of all classes walked from Hyde Park to the Strand in bad weather conditions, raising public awareness of women’s suffrage.
In the same year, ‘The Case for Women’s Suffrage’ was published, in which Florence contributed her chapter – ‘The Woman’s Suffrage Movement in the Nineteenth Century’. She commenced by stating that, ‘In education, social freedom, and opportunity, most satisfactory progress has been made by women during the last century. But our political standing is still as it was in 1790….’.
She would have to wait until 1918 before an act was finally passed allowing some women to vote.
Florence was widely known as a gifted speaker, considered to be one of the best women speakers of the day, with a ‘fine physical presence, and a clear, full voice, which (carried) to the far end of the room’. She impressed audiences with her mind, and was described as ‘massive and powerful, rather than delicate or subtle.’ The Westminster Gazette described her as ‘one of the most lucid, graceful and eloquent of platform speakers’, whilst others described her as clear, convincing, honest and inspiring.
As a powerful orator, Florence had magnetism. She was able to respond with quick-witted replies to interruptions. Anyone who tried to disconcert this gifted woman with questions, was said to come off second best in their encounter with her.
Sir W Vernon Harcourt, lawyer and Liberal cabinet member, is attributed to saying this of Florence after hearing her speak, “Now I know why we keep ladies behind the grille in the House of Commons; we could not withstand their eloquence on the floor of the House.”
The ‘Ladies’ Gallery’ in the House of Commons had windows covered with heavy metal grilles, making it difficult to see or hear, symbolising women’s exclusion from Parliament.
Florence’s passion for the temperance cause began during her early years. She signed the pledge of total abstinence in 1877. She joined the BWTA in around 1884 and became President of the Muswell Hill Branch in Londo. In 1887, Florence gave a stirring address at the Annual Public Meeting of the BWTA, chaired by Sir Wilfrid Lawson, temperance campaigner, radical and Liberal Party politician.
Her temperance work evolved after her visit to the US, where she studied Prohibition laws. It was in the US that Florence first met Frances Willard of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union and with whom she later clashed with, along with BWTA President, Lady Henry Somerset. As delegate to the First Congress of the WWCTU in America, she had personally supported Lady Henry during this trip and by 1893, she was listed as a member of the National Executive Committee of the BWTA. Lady Henry recorded a debt of gratitude to Florence for addressing many branches and the formation of many new ones.
Florence was elected Superintendent of the Political Department of work and also the Police Matron Department which she led the campaign for. Florence headed up this newly organised department of work and wrote the pamphlet ‘A Plea for the Appointment of Police Matrons at Police Stations’, published in 1894.
By 1902, Florence had seen marked success through her efforts, by the establishment of matrons to attend the police courts and police stations. London and most large towns had now appointed these matrons in order to supervise female detainees, rather than male guards and policeman as in previous years.
During 1894, she organised five new branches of the BWTA and ‘rendered stalwart service in all parts of England and Wales’. As a prominent member of the BWTA, she travelled widely, speaking and lecturing as an ‘uncompromising advocate’ for the temperance cause.
Difficulties arose for Florence within the BWTA when she spoke out against the Women’s Christian Temperance Union along with their President, Frances Willard, regarding their stance on the lynching of African Americans.
Ida B Wells was an African American journalist and civil rights campaigner, who travelled to Britain twice in the 1890’s, in order to gain support for her campaign against the lynching atrocities taking place in America.
After Ida’s second tour to Britain in 1894, the London Anti-Lynching Committee was founded. BWTA President Lady Henry Somerset was a member of the committee and Florence was Honorary Secretary. Ida spoke on the subject of lynch law at the 1894 Council Meeting of the BWTA, chaired by Lady Henry and attended by her American counterpart in the temperance movement and close friend, Frances Willard. The BWTA was an affiliated organisation to the WCTU.
The southern unions of the WCTU in America were segregated at the time, as opposed to those which were united in the northern states. Wells and Willard clashed over this divide across the WCTU.
The BWTA made anti-lynching resolutions at the Council meeting in order to be clear that the association was firmly against the brutality of lynching.
Around this time, Florence resigned as Superintendent of the Political Department but continued to head up the department for Police Matrons. Members of the Hull branch of the NBWTA requested arbitration for Florence in order to find an impartial resolution to the dispute over her actions, but the request was rejected. She was not re-elected to the National Executive Committee.
Miss Frances Willard - WCTU
In 1896, Florence gave her final report as Superintendent of the Police Matrons Department with a personal statement ‘I commend this Department to each delegate individually; the personal responsibility is now theirs, for their Superintendent has to the best of her ability prepared the way for them during the three years she held office. Whether re-elected or not to continue my service as Superintendent of the Police Matron Department I shall always be glad to afford any help in my power to those anxious to extend the system in their own localities.’ Florence was not re-elected as Superintendent of the department.
BWTA Work Continues…
Although the Police Matron Department had ceased and Florence was no longer on the Executive Committee of the BWTA, she continued to be recorded on their list of National Speakers and as President of the Muswell Hill Branch until 1908.
In 1903, Lady Henry’s presidency had ended, and Rosalind Countess of Carlisle was elected to the position. This coincided in the following year with a ‘Welcome Home’ to Florence following her tour of Australasia and India. The gathering was attended by a crowd of 350 members and friends, including members of the National Executive Committee. It appears that she was welcomed back from her travels with open arms, following the difficulties within the BWTA during the 1890’s.
Temperance Travels
From 1902 to 1904, Florence went on a temperance tour across the world. After a prolonged stay in Australia, New Zealand and Japan, she went on to India in November 1903.
Florence wrote home to England whilst on her travels – and firsthand accounts were published in the ‘White Ribbon’, the temperance periodical of the BWTA. By the time Florence arrived in New Zealand, women there had been allowed the right to vote in parliamentary elections since 1893, whilst the women back home were still campaigning.
Florence wrote enthusiastically about her experience of Election Day. She lamented the fact that, had she been resident in New Zealand for twelve months by that point rather than seven, she could have returned home as a fully-fledged parliamentary voter. Although unable to vote herself, Florence watched those fortunate women in the voting booths, whilst handing out papers encouraging people to vote for prohibition.
Having described the activities on voting day, Florence pointed out that having the right to vote did not make these women of New Zealand any less domesticated. They were still the most ‘assiduous housewives, devoted mothers and considerate hostesses’. Florence was evidently trying to appease those who were concerned that allowing women the vote would undermine their womanly duties in the home!
By the time Florence had reached Japan in 1903 and wrote to the newspapers about ‘The Land of the Rising Sun’, she had travelled more than 8000 miles since leaving Wellington, including over 6000 miles by steamship. Florence was there at a precarious time, just prior to Russia declaring war on Japan over territory. One newspaper report recounts her ‘….adventures up country, being shadowed and run down to earth in her hotel on suspicion of being a Russian spy. She was, however, able to establish her identity, as she was merely corresponding for a newspaper syndicate in New Zealand on the manners and customs of Japan.’
On a successful tour of India, Florence developed an interest in the work of the Anglo-Indian Temperance Association. She addressed large, mainly male dominated audiences, in at least fifty cities.
During her addresses in India, she spoke with her usual eloquence, but sometimes forceful, nature of the drinking customs that the British had brought with them to the country – as well as the consequences of this to the Indian population. She viewed the drink traffic as a major contributor to the poverty that she encountered there. ‘Grogshops’ (liquor shops) were licensed in cities and remote districts of India.
After the Tour
Following her travels, Florence was added to the Special Lecture List of the BWTA for ‘The Drink Traffic in India’ until 1909. She went on to address many meetings on her findings. Florence related to audiences with stories such as how when she arrived in India, the very first drink she was offered was not a restorative drink of water as might be expected, but a whiskey and soda, from the magistrate who was collecting taxes on the sale of liquor no less. This raised ironic laughter from the audience.
In 1909, Florence was still a member of the Women’s Liberal Federation. By 1911, she had withdrawn her name from the BWTA as Correspondent for the Drink Traffic in India but was still on the National Speakers list.
The last record of Florence in the Annual Reports of the BWTA was in 1915, as a speaker at their Annual Public Meeting. In that same year, Florence was recorded in the news as having donated to the funds for Scottish Women’s Hospital for Foreign Service, established in France by the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies. The fund was set up to maintain the military hospital for the sick and wounded, close to the front line. In addition, she wrote a letter to the Westminster Gazette as a visitor of the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Families Association, about the financial hardships endured by the mothers of serving soldiers once they had enlisted.
Later Years
In 1917 during the First World War, the government started a campaign to encourage the population to adopt voluntary rationing of food, in order to try to avoid the need for compulsory rationing due to wartime shortages. In Dunmow, Essex, Florence was a speaker at a public meeting for the ‘Food Economy Campaign’, on top of her continued donations to the Scottish Womens’ Hospital for Home and Foreign Service.
Following her earlier travels to India, she continued her connection with the Anglo-Indian Temperance Association and was listed as a member of their Executive Committee.
In 1918, after years of campaigning, the Representation of the People Act was passed which allowed some women over the age of 30 who met a property qualification, to vote in general elections. Florence was in her 60’s by this point and may have met the property ownership criteria in order to vote. It does not appear that she ever married, which would have granted her the vote through a husband’s property.
During the later years of her life in the 1920’s, Florence lived in Thaxted, Essex, where she was involved in the Thaxted Horticultural Society. At the first annual meeting of the society in 1923, she was elected as a committee member. Florence exhibited at the Thaxted Flower Shows of 1926 and 1927, winning prizes for her potatoes, onions, carrots and lettuce. In the 1926 instalment of the show, she won first prize for the best kept flower and vegetable garden.
In 1924, Florence was still maintaining her Liberal stance, when she supported the nomination of Arthur Musgrove Mathews as Liberal candidate for Saffron Walden, Essex.
Death
She died in March 1928, at 71 years of age, in the City of Florence during her customary winter stay in Italy. One news article states that her death was due to heart failure. Her memorial in the BWTA’s publication, The White Ribbon and Wings, records that, having gone to Italy, Florence over-exerted herself by going on to Sicily. She returned to Florence and died there.
Unfortunately, Florence did not get to experience the equality that came with the passing of the Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act, July 1928. This gave women over the age of 21 the vote and finally achieved the same voting rights as men.
In her will, Florence left a £1000 5% War Loan to the hospital in her hometown of Scarborough, for the endowment of a bed in memory of her mother and father.
Further interesting details of her will appeared in the news. During the Victorian period, many people had a real fear of being buried alive, not having the protection of modern-day medical practice. Florence had presumably heard horror stories and accounts to this effect, and so in order to provide some assurance against the possibility of being cremated alive, ‘….directed the executors to employ a doctor to sever “my jugular vein or other vein or artery for the purpose of ascertaining that I am in fact dead and not in any other state having the semblance of death, in order to make certain that I am not cremated alive, and I bequeath to such doctor £10 for his trouble.” Her death occurred some years after the end of the Victorian era, but Florence evidently wanted to ensure some peace of mind.
Florence was laid to rest in the ‘English Cemetery’, Cimitero degli Inglesi, on the south side of the river Arno in Florence, Italy.
Members of the BWTA circa 1890's
(appears to be Florence Balgarnie wearing cloak – middle row, far left)
Sources include –
https://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/transformingsociety/electionsvoting/womenvote
BWTA Archive, White Ribbon Association
Biographical Sketch – Miss Florence Balgarnie – Wings, Vol. XXV No.5, May 1907
The Women’s Suffrage Movement: A Reference Guide 1866-1928 – Elizabeth Crawford, 1999
Aristocracy, Temperance and Social Reform – The Life of Lady Henry Somerset by Olwen Claire Niessen, 2007
Quiver, Temperance Notes and News, January 1904, p439
British Newspaper Archives – various newspaper articles
University Extension Movement at Cambridge, Science, 21 Jan 1887, Vol 9, No 207
Quiver, Jan 1904, Temperance Notes and News, p439
Images –
Ida B Wells – The New York Public Library, Digital Collections –
https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47df-8dbe-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99
NUWSS – Courtesy British Library (Shelfmark: 8413.k.5)
The March of the Suffragettes image – Courtesy British Library (Shelfmark: C.121.g.1)
