Lady Margaret Haig Mackworth, Viscountess Rhondda (neeThomas)

Margaret, Lady Mackworth (1883 – 1958), 32, was the a prominent British suffragette and only child of David Alfred Thomas (also known as D.A. Thomas) and Sybil Haig. Lady Mackworth and her father, and his secretary Arnold Rhys-Evans, were returning to Wales on Lusitania after visiting D.A. Thomas’ interests in Pennsylvania coal mines. Lady Mackworth, D.A. Thomas, and Arnold Rhys-Evans all survived.

Early life and marriage

Margaret Mackworth was born as Margaret Haig Thomas on 12 June 1883 as the only child of David Alfred Thomas (commonly known as D. A. Thomas) and Sybil Haig. As a child, Margaret was taught to speak in French and German, and grew up to be very close to her father. Margaret was educated at Notting Hill High School, St. Leonards School of St. Andrews, and Somerville College, Oxford.

In 1908, Margaret married a neighbor, Sir Humphrey Mackworth, a man twelve years her senior. The union was a mismatch from the start. Humphrey loved fox hunting, but Margaret thought hunting to be uncivilized and often prefered to spend her hours reading. She found married life to be unfulfilling and her way of life too sheltered for her liking.

Feminism and involvement with the Pankhursts

Beginning in her childhood, Margaret had noticed that while ambition was nurtured as a virtue among young men, the same quality was looked upon as a vice among young women. Noting this disparity, she became an ardent feminist and joined Emmeline Pankhurst’s Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) in 1908, four months after her marriage. Margaret invited Emmeline Pankhurst to speak at the first meeting in Newport. Emmeline, unable to attend, sent her daughter Sylvia instead. Sir Humphrey refused her entry to the house.

In joining the Pankhursts, Margaret Mackworth sought to educate herself in all facets of feminism and read as much as she could on the subject. Many of her sources were pamphlets and news articles, but she found books on the subject to be relatively few. Lady Mackworth was able to get her books at the Cavendish Bentinck Library, which at the time was supplying the suffragettes with books they could not procure in the ordinary way. She did, however, find useful John Stuart Mill’s Subjection of Women, Olive Schreiner’s Woman and Labour, Cicely Hamilton’s Marriage as a Trade, and George Bernard Shaw’s Quintessence of Ibsenism. Also among the books supplied was Havelock Ellis’ The Psychology of Sex, a book which, in those times, would not have been able to be taken out without a signed doctor’s certificate. In an amusing incident, D. A. Thomas tried to obtain Ellis’ book but became indignant when he was refused access to a book that his daughter had already read.

Lady Mackworth was a reluctant supporter of the WSPU’s arson campaign, and her role in trying to destroy a post box with a chemical bomb landed her in jail. When she got to her cell, she was appalled at the dilapidation of the prison. Nevertheless, she refused to let her husband bail her out and promptly went on a hunger strike. The hunger strike, as well as the jailers’ growing concern for her health due to the strike, led to her early release after five days. She then vowed, “I shall campaign for the suffrage cause until the franchise is given to women.”

When World War I broke out, the WSPU leadership decided to temporarily abandon its militant campaign for the vote in order to further the war effort. Margaret Mackworth then worked closely with D. A. Thomas as personal assistant and proxy in her father’s vast coal and corporate interests. D. A. Thomas was also sent to the United States by the future prime minister David Lloyd George to arrange the supply of munitions for the British armed forces.

War service

In 1917, D. A. Thomas was appointed Minister of Food and given the title of Lord Rhondda. Margaret was not overlooked, and also given a position; as Lady Rhondda she became the Director of Women’s Department of the Ministry of National Service. Her 1918 report on the Women’s Royal Air Force (WRAF) was highly critical of the WRAF commandant, Violet Douglas-Pennant, and led to Douglas-Pennant’s dismissal. She was replaced by Helen Gwynne-Vaughan.

Attempt to reform the House of Lords

The British government recognized the right of women over thirty to vote in 1918. That same year in June, David Alfred Thomas was named Viscount Rhondda. He passed away one month later.

When D. A. Thomas died, Margaret attempted to take her father’s seat in the House of Lords as Viscountess Rhondda, citing the 1919 Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act as her birthright. The act stated “a person shall not be disqualified by sex or marriage from the exercise of any public function.” The committee to which her petition was referred agreed that she had the right to sit in the House of Lords. This decision, however, alarmed many peers including Lord Chancellor Birkenhead. Birkenhead set up another committee to reconsider the petition, constituting of himself and thirty other concerned peers. Margaret’s claim was then swiftly rejected.

Quoting George Bernard Shaw, who highly respected Margaret, the House of Lords saw Lady Rhondda as a “terror.” Because of her political business acumen, “the House of Lords has risen up and said, ‘If Lady Rhondda comes in here, we go away!’ ” Shaw goes further to say that if she had gained entry, “there would be such a show-up of the general business ignorance and imbecility of the male sex as never was before.”

Margaret persisted to change the law to accommodate women. She had her lawyer draft a bill to remove the sex bar and had Viscount Astor propose to Parliament. Although Astor proposed the same bill almost annually from 1924 to 1930 with the bill at times coming within two votes of passing, Viscount Astor would not succeed.

The issue of women in the House of Lords was revived in the 1940s, and Margaret and others launched a petition to show there existed public support for women in the House of Lords. The first six months saw 50,000 signatures, including the principals of the women’s colleges of Oxford and Cambridge. The Lords themselves finally passed a motion for women’s admission in 1949, but the Labour government under Prime Minister Attlee refused to deliver the promised legislation.

Time and Tide

Even though Margaret had been denied a seat in the House of Lords, she continued to further her cause in the magazine she founded in 1920, Time and Tide. The magazine supported left-wing and feminist causes, and was initially edited by Helen Archdale. Margaret would take over in 1926.

As time went on, Time and Tide and Margaret moved to the right. Her magazine became an anti-Communist, conservative magazine that drifted away from the feminist struggle. Despite any changes in her political philosophy, she did not let politics interfere with the makings of a good publication. Margaret was devoted to Time and Tide single-mindedly. Contributors to Time and Tide over the years included but were not limited to Nancy Astor, George Orwell, George Bernard Shaw, Emmeline Pankhurst, Virginia Wolf, and D. H. Lawrence. Even though Time and Tide commanded international attention, the magazine never became self-supporting and it is estimated that in the thirty-eight years Margaret owned the magazine, the publication cost her over £500,000.

In later years, Margaret unsuccessfully tried to find new support, a buyer who would continue the publication. By the time Margaret died suddenly in London on 20 July 1958, the magazine had exhausted her personal funds and there was not enough money to cover the major legacies of her will. Time and Tide was saved temporarily from bankruptcy by friends and readers. It stopped publication in 1977.

Personal life

In her personal life, Margaret divorced Sir Humphrey in 1922. Sir Humphrey was a Conservative and didn’t quite see eye-to-eye with his Liberal wife. The deterioration of their relationship had actually occurred very early in their marriage. Her autobiography, This Was My World, which showcased her philosophy of life, was published in 1933.

Legacy

Slack attendance in the House of Lords during the 50’s made the Lords an ineffective governing body. Full-scale reform could not be postponed any longer. Faced with this realization, Lord Home introduced a bill that created peerages for women. Continuing to exclude half the population when there was a shortage of members, as Lord Hailsham put it, was “idiotic.” Four women were finally appointed to the House of Lords in 1958 — Lady Ravensdale, Lady Swanborough, Lady Elliot, and Lady Wootton. By then it was much too late for Margaret, Viscountess Rhondda, but her legacy had paved the way for women in generations to follow.

source http://www.rmslusitania.info/people/saloon/margaret-mackworth/

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Further Reading

http://www.southwalesargus.co.uk/news/11781747.Newport_suffragette_...

References:

Ballard, Dr. Robert D. with Spencer Dunmore. Exploring the Lusitania. Warner Books, Inc., 1995.

Hickey, Des and Gus Smith. Seven Days to Disaster. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1981.

Hoehling, A. A. and Mary Hoehling. The Last Voyage of the Lusitania. Madison Books, 1956.

“Margaret Haig Thomas,” Spartacus Educational. http://spartacus-educational.com/Whaig.htm

Preston, Diana. Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy. Berkley Books, 2002.

Reyher, Rebecca Hourwich. Search and Struggle for Equality and Independence. Online. <http://texts.cdlib.org/dynaxml/servlet/BookView?source=oac/oh/reyhe...>.

Sutherland, Duncan. “The Admission of Women to the House of Lords,” Centre for Advancement of Women in Politics. Online. <http://www.qub.ac.uk/cawp/research/pitor.htm>.

"Suffragette Viscountess Rhondda's Newport bomb attack remembered". BBC Wales News.

"Lady Mackworth" (PDF). British Journal of Nursing 58: 125. 17 February 1917.

"Institute of Directors launch annual Mackworth Lecture"