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| Notable Sussex Women |
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Pearl Binder Lady Elwyn-Jones (1904–1989)
Author, artist and journalist
She began life in humble circumstances in Lancashire, travelled extensively in Russia and
China, studied art and fashion and trained in lithography at the Central School of Art. In the
1920s she moved to the East End, where she championed the Pearly Kings and Queens,
about whom she wrote a musical (When the Summer Comes Again); later writing another
(Down the Road) about Victorian costermongers.
Her range of interests, talents and accomplishments was extraordinarily diverse and her life
exceptionally productive. She presented an early television programme (on the history of
fashion), broadcast on radio, wrote a biography, novels and children’s stories (one was Muffs
and Morals) and was also a journalist, sculptor, ceramicist, stained glass and graphic artist.
She made stage costumes, designed a Pearly mug and plate for Wedgwood and twenty-two
armorial windows for the House of Lords, lithographically illustrated Thomas Burke’s book
The Real East End and exhibited at Whitechapel Art Gallery. Her feature on the gaiety and
charm of Brighton appeared in Geographic Magazine in 1963 and the following year she
wrote Treacle Terrace, a children’s novel about the twin evils of property speculators and
crooked solicitors.
Known to her friends as Polly, she wore sweeping robe dresses in gorgeous, ethnic fabrics
with harem trousers and pretty, flat sandals. She was as anti-high heels as she was pro-
women; in 1961 she called for a woman to be secretary-general of the United Nations, as she
believed this would bring about world peace.
Aged thirty-three she married law student Frederick (later, Lord) Elwyn-Jones, who became
an East End Labour MP, barrister, judge and eventually Lord Chancellor. They had a son
and two daughters and lived at 2 St Margaret’s Place, Brighton, in the 1960s, then at 17
Lewes Crescent, Kemp Town, until her death, taking a deep interest in local issues. A blue
plaque on the latter commemorates both husband and wife.
Author, artist and journalist
She began life in humble circumstances in Lancashire, travelled extensively in Russia and
China, studied art and fashion and trained in lithography at the Central School of Art. In the
1920s she moved to the East End, where she championed the Pearly Kings and Queens,
about whom she wrote a musical (When the Summer Comes Again); later writing another
(Down the Road) about Victorian costermongers.
Her range of interests, talents and accomplishments was extraordinarily diverse and her life
exceptionally productive. She presented an early television programme (on the history of
fashion), broadcast on radio, wrote a biography, novels and children’s stories (one was Muffs
and Morals) and was also a journalist, sculptor, ceramicist, stained glass and graphic artist.
She made stage costumes, designed a Pearly mug and plate for Wedgwood and twenty-two
armorial windows for the House of Lords, lithographically illustrated Thomas Burke’s book
The Real East End and exhibited at Whitechapel Art Gallery. Her feature on the gaiety and
charm of Brighton appeared in Geographic Magazine in 1963 and the following year she
wrote Treacle Terrace, a children’s novel about the twin evils of property speculators and
crooked solicitors.
Known to her friends as Polly, she wore sweeping robe dresses in gorgeous, ethnic fabrics
with harem trousers and pretty, flat sandals. She was as anti-high heels as she was pro-
women; in 1961 she called for a woman to be secretary-general of the United Nations, as she
believed this would bring about world peace.
Aged thirty-three she married law student Frederick (later, Lord) Elwyn-Jones, who became
an East End Labour MP, barrister, judge and eventually Lord Chancellor. They had a son
and two daughters and lived at 2 St Margaret’s Place, Brighton, in the 1960s, then at 17
Lewes Crescent, Kemp Town, until her death, taking a deep interest in local issues. A blue
plaque on the latter commemorates both husband and wife.
Clementina Black (1853–1922)
Political activist and novelist
A daughter of solicitor David Black, Brighton’s Town Clerk and coroner, she was born at 58
Ship Street. After her mother died, Miss Black, then twenty-two, took care of her invalid father
and her seven younger brothers. She wrote two novels: A Sussex Idyll (1877) and Orlando
(1880) before she and her sister Constance moved to London, where they mixed with
political and literary figures including Eleanor Marx and Amy Levy.
In 1893 Miss Black suffered multiple personal tragedies. Her brother Arthur murdered his wife
Jessie and baby son Walter at their home, 77 Goldstone Villas, Hove, before committing
suicide; six months later her father died. She refused to marry, because ‘The law denies to a
married woman the freedom of action which more and more women are coming to regard not
only as their just but also as their dearest treasure’, but she adopted her late brother’s
surviving child, five-year-old Gertrude Speedwell Black.
She became active in the WPPL and, as its delegate to the 1888 TUC conference, moved
the first-ever resolution for equal pay and inspired Annie Besant to help the Bryant & May
match workers. She co-founded the WTUA and for twenty years collected and publicised
information on women’s work in 117 trades. She was an active member of the Fabian Society
and co-founded the Consumers’ League. For years she travelled the country making
speeches to persuade women to join trades unions. She supported the introduction of
wages’ boards to enforce a minimum wage and was an executive member of the Anti-
Sweating League, working with Cicely Corbett Fisher to organise conferences.
She wrote several books related to labour, including Married Women’s Work (1915,
reprinted 1980) and continued to write novels, although the only one that met with success
was An Agitator (1894), based on the trade union movement. Because women could not
influence employment legislation without the vote, she became a fervent suffragist,
inaugurating a declaration in 1906 that was signed by thousands. She became vice-
president of the NUWSS in 1913 and edited The Common Cause.
In recognition of her unceasing endeavours on behalf of working women, in 1913 she was
granted a civil-list pension of £75 a year. She died at her home in Barnes and was buried in
East Sheen Cemetery. Brighton bus 658 is named for her.
Political activist and novelist
A daughter of solicitor David Black, Brighton’s Town Clerk and coroner, she was born at 58
Ship Street. After her mother died, Miss Black, then twenty-two, took care of her invalid father
and her seven younger brothers. She wrote two novels: A Sussex Idyll (1877) and Orlando
(1880) before she and her sister Constance moved to London, where they mixed with
political and literary figures including Eleanor Marx and Amy Levy.
In 1893 Miss Black suffered multiple personal tragedies. Her brother Arthur murdered his wife
Jessie and baby son Walter at their home, 77 Goldstone Villas, Hove, before committing
suicide; six months later her father died. She refused to marry, because ‘The law denies to a
married woman the freedom of action which more and more women are coming to regard not
only as their just but also as their dearest treasure’, but she adopted her late brother’s
surviving child, five-year-old Gertrude Speedwell Black.
She became active in the WPPL and, as its delegate to the 1888 TUC conference, moved
the first-ever resolution for equal pay and inspired Annie Besant to help the Bryant & May
match workers. She co-founded the WTUA and for twenty years collected and publicised
information on women’s work in 117 trades. She was an active member of the Fabian Society
and co-founded the Consumers’ League. For years she travelled the country making
speeches to persuade women to join trades unions. She supported the introduction of
wages’ boards to enforce a minimum wage and was an executive member of the Anti-
Sweating League, working with Cicely Corbett Fisher to organise conferences.
She wrote several books related to labour, including Married Women’s Work (1915,
reprinted 1980) and continued to write novels, although the only one that met with success
was An Agitator (1894), based on the trade union movement. Because women could not
influence employment legislation without the vote, she became a fervent suffragist,
inaugurating a declaration in 1906 that was signed by thousands. She became vice-
president of the NUWSS in 1913 and edited The Common Cause.
In recognition of her unceasing endeavours on behalf of working women, in 1913 she was
granted a civil-list pension of £75 a year. She died at her home in Barnes and was buried in
East Sheen Cemetery. Brighton bus 658 is named for her.
Excerpted from the book Notable Sussex Women (c) Helena Wojtczak 2008 |
| Some of the 164 Brighton area women featured in the book Notable Sussex Women |
| All pages (c) Helena Wojtczak 2009 |
Images on this page are not included in the book Notable Sussex Women
